Map of Cameroon

Summary

On our way to the police
station, the police officers insulted us and beat us with batons on our heads
and bodies. They kept saying they were going to burn us for being dirty
pédés [faggots]…. The next morning, they began to question
us about our homosexuality, and on Tuesday, they took us to Channel Two and to
Cameroon Radio and Television. They paraded us on the news saying the police
had dismantled a network of homosexuals.

My brothers told my
children’s fathers that I was a lesbian. Immediately a family meeting was
convened, and it was decided that I should not bring the children up. I had no
say, because I am a lesbian. So the children now live with their respective
fathers…. I still try to contact my children to visit them, but the
fathers deny me visits.

—Laure, a 34-year-old unemployed beautician living
with HIV since 2009, Douala.

In Cameroon, prejudice against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and
transgender (LGBT) people is both very common and very public. It is so
widespread that the French word “homosexuel” entered the public
discourse to suggest all things evil. People commonly say that homosexuality is
foreign and negates African values. Newspapers have said it is “corrupt”
and “abominable.” Some people interviewed consider it a
“perversion,” a “cult,” or “sorcery.” In
the past five years, attacks on gays, lesbians, bisexual, and transgender
people have been a common refrain in politicians’ speeches, media
reports, religious homilies, community life—and enforcement of the law.

Article 347 bis, of the Cameroon Penal Code punishes
“sexual relations with a person of the same sex” with a prison term
of six months to five years and with a fine of 20,000 to 200,000 CFA francs
[US$40 to $400]. This article was entered into law by presidential decree in
1972 without the usual review by the National Assembly. Until five years ago,
there was little information publicly available on its enforcement. But on May
21, 2005, police arrested 32 people at a nightclub in Yaoundé in the
first of a series of high-profile arrests and prosecutions under this article.
Arrests continue to this day.

Beyond arrest, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender
people or individuals perceived as such are at higher risk for other problems.
They may be more vulnerable to violent attacks inside and outside the home, as
they risk arrest for homosexual conduct if they report a crime. Police and
prison officers routinely have abused detainees they suspect of same-sex sexual
relationships, and have done so with impunity. Gay, lesbian, bisexual, and
transgender people at risk of HIV/AIDS infection or who are HIV positive have
more difficulty in obtaining legal protection, including in prison. A general
climate of fear has meant that rigid gender codes are strictly enforced and
people live out their lives in secrecy.

Since the 2005 arrests, officials and media outlets have
portrayed being gay or lesbian not as a private matter but as a menace to
public safety. Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Justice Amadou Ali said in
2006 in a letter to International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission
(IGLHRC) that Article 347 bis must be enforced because homosexuality has no
part in “positive African cultural values.” Monsignor Victor Tonyé
Bakot, the Catholic Archbishop of Yaoundé, denounced homosexuality in
his 2005 Christmas homily, calling it a “perversion.” Newspapers
have published a flurry of viciously anti-gay articles about government
officials, outing people purported to be gay by publishing their names and
calling them the “faggots of the Republic,” and inventing a word to
describe Cameroon, as a “homocraty,” where they allege rich,
corrupt, power-hungry homosexuals are attempting to take over the state.

People arrested under Article 347 bis have routinely been
denied basic rights. They are often held without charge for more than 48 hours,
exceeding the maximum time allowed by Cameroonian law. When charges are issued,
the courts often deny detainees bail, or else detainees are unable to afford
its terms. Trials can take place months after arrest, during which time people
languish in pre-trial detention in police stations or in prison, mixed with the
convicted population.

Judges may convict and sentence those arrested under Article
347 bis without clear and credible evidence that they ever engaged in a
homosexual act. Even when judges dismiss the charges, prosecutors have been
known to charge people again before they can leave custody, so that they must
remain in pre-trial detention until a second hearing takes place.

More disturbing still is that people arrested under Article
347 bis suffer a number of abuses while in both police and prison custody.

Police beat the bodies, heads, and soles of the feet of men
they believe to be homosexual. The police authorities often order inhuman,
degrading, and intrusive anal examinations to supposedly prove a history of
penetration, which actually cannot be scientifically assessed. In prison,
guards insult Article 347 bis detainees, hit them, throw water at them, and
threaten them with rape. Other prisoners beat them with stones and fists,
sexually abuse them, and urinate and defecate on their mattresses. Prison
guards have put the Article 347 bis detainees in solitary confinement and chained
them by the arms and feet. Boys under the age of 18 arrested under Article 347
bis have been placed in cells with adult male prisoners because prison guards
say that if the boys share a cell with other minors they will teach them to be
homosexuals.

The detainees often do not protest. They may be afraid to
lodge a complaint, or unaware that this is possible, or unable to afford a
lawyer. When they do complain, there is often no response, or further abuse
ensues. Human rights researchers in Cameroon and government officials
themselves say that in general, there is no mechanism for holding police and
prison officials accountable for the abuses they commit.

Since 2005, police have continued to use Article 347 bis to
arrest ordinary Cameroonians, including university students, small-scale
craftsmen, skilled laborers, unskilled workers in hotels and restaurants, and
the unemployed. On June 7, 2006, police arrested four young women in Douala
after the grandmother of one of the girls tipped them off that they were
lesbians, and each was sentenced to three years of probation.[1]
Between July and August 2007, police detained nine men in Douala and two in
Yaoundé under various circumstances related to perceived homosexual
conduct.[2]
At the time of the writing of this report, the most recent arrest occurred on
March 29, 2010, when police detained three men, including an Australian
citizen, who were simply talking in the lobby of a hotel in Douala. According
to the detainees, the police, acting on a tip, told the Australian they
suspected he was having sex with the other men.[3]

Though arrests remain relatively rare, they create a climate
of fear. Family members have reported other family members to police. Landlords
have reported their tenants. Friends have reported friends. Thieves and other
perpetrators of crimes have simply accused their victims of homosexuality to
deflect police attention and escape justice. Others have used the threat of
reporting homosexuality to extort money or favors. The consequence is that people
are punished for a homosexual identity, not for the specific outlawed practice
of homosexual sex.

The problem extends far beyond the criminal justice system,
especially for women who identify as lesbian or bisexual. Interviews for this
report suggested that there are fewer women than men arrested and jailed, yet
women who do not dress in typically feminine attire, or who engage in conduct
deemed unfeminine, are often singled out for persecution. Women suspected of
having sex with women can be specifically targeted for rape and sexual attacks.
They can lose custody of their children with little chance of challenging this
because of their fear of arrest and jail. Like men, they can be ostracized by
their families or suffer physical abuse at the hands of family members, which
is especially difficult in a society where women are expected to remain
dependent and in the family fold.

Even if a person is not
arrested, the climate of prosecution can demand a personal secrecy that can be
psychologically devastating and may amount to persecution. Out of 45
interviewees, only a handful had willingly come out to their families and
friends. Consistently, men and women we interviewed mentioned having a partner
of the opposite sex to “cover up” and avoid stigma, discrimination,
and violence within their family and community.

The experience of being branded a homosexual in the criminal
justice system can change the trajectories of people’s lives. It tears
families apart, and causes individuals to be ostracized from their communities,
or to lose their jobs. After an arrest, a person lives in fear that even a
casual conversation with a person of the same sex could lead to another arrest.

There are also health consequences to the state’s
criminalization of same-sex activities. Cameroon does not have HIV/AIDS
programs especially targeting the distinct and particular needs of men who have
sex with men (MSM) or women who have sex with women (WSW), which makes the
spread of the virus more likely among those communities. Because same-sex sex
is criminalized under Article 347 bis, the state keeps no statistics on HIV
prevalence among gay, lesbian, and bisexual men and women and conducts no
survey of the knowledge or behavior in these communities related to
transmission of the virus.[4]
The state prohibits the distribution of condoms in prisons, though HIV
prevalence in prisons is high, male prisoners may engage in homosexual sex, and
rape within prison is common.

Alternatives-Cameroun and
L’Association pour la Défense des Droits des Homosexuels (ADEFHO),
two national organizations advocating for the rights of LGBT people, have
observed that enforcing criminal laws against homosexual conduct in Cameroon
has had a grave negative impact on the HIV/AIDS prevention and outreach strategies
they implement. It has had a chilling effect on LGBT people accessing public
health services. Furthermore, criminalization leads to stigma, and stigma
places people at a higher risk of violence by non-state actors.[5]

Pleas by national organizations and recommendations from
international bodies have not been enough to end the prosecution of people
under Article 347 bis. In 2006, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detentions
(WGAD) called on Cameroon to amend its domestic law criminalizing homosexual
conduct to comply with international legal standards.[6]
During Cameroon’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) in December 2008, the
UN Human Rights Council recommended that homosexual conduct be decriminalized.
Cameroon did not accept this recommendation. Cameroon also refused the
recommendation by the UN Human Rights Committee in July 2010, which called upon
the government to work to stem social prejudice and stigmatization against LGBT
people, including in public health programs, in order to “ensure universal
access to HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment, care and support."[7]

In May 2010, Cameroonian and international organizations
called on the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights to pressure
Cameroon into decriminalizing consensual sexual acts between adults of the same
sex. In September 2010, in a high-level panel at the UN on “Ending
Criminal Laws and Violence against LGBT People,” High Commissioner on
Human Rights Navanethem Pillay set as a priority the decriminalization of
same-sex acts worldwide.

lternatives-Cameroun
petitioned the National Assembly for decriminalization in November 2009. More
than 1,500 people in Cameroon signed the petition; however, the National
Assembly has not even considered introducing the topic into discussion.
Cameroon’s refusal to eliminate homosexual acts from its Penal Code
contradicts the terms of its own domestic law, which mandates that
“provisions of criminal law shall be subject to the rules of
international law and to all treaties duly promulgated and published.”[8] Courts should but do not interpret Article
347 bis in this way. Furthermore, the government’s refusal keeps a
provision on the books that continues to violate basic rights of a group of
vulnerable and marginalized Cameroonians.

Key Recommendations

Cameroon should
decriminalize homosexual conduct, refrain from incarcerating adults or
children for such conduct, and publicly condemn all acts of violence on
the grounds of perceived sexual orientation and gender identity, and all
homophobic speech by state officials, in order to guarantee full
protection of the rights of all Cameroonians.

Cameroon should formulate public health
programs and health care frameworks under the National Multi-Sectoral
Strategic Framework on HIV/AIDS, by making an effort to acknowledge
and reach out to LGBT people and educate health professionals and the
community on sexual orientation and gender identity. It should also obtain
resources for programs that serve to reduce the spread of HIV and the
deaths associated with AIDS among men who have sex with men and women who
have sex with women.

Cameroonian authorities should stop arrests on the grounds
of perceived “homosexuality” and take disciplinary action
against police personnel found guilty of misconduct enabled by these legal
provisions, including violence, extortion and ill-treatment. The
government should introduce trainings on sexual orientation and gender
identity in the police and prison services.

Cameroonian authorities should publicly denounce the abuse
of vulnerable populations on the grounds of their perceived sexual
orientation or gender identity and protect them from violence by private
actors in public and private spaces, including arresting and prosecuting
the perpetrators of such violence.

Deliberate efforts should be put in place
to facilitate education, training and awareness, building on sexual
orientation and gender identity for service providers engaged in the
administration of justice, such as judicial officers, prosecutors, police,
and social welfare and health officials.

Methodology

This report is based
primarily on research conducted in the Cameroonian cities of Buea, Douala,
Ebolowa, and Yaoundé from September 1 to October 4, 2009 by: Joseph
Achille Tiedjou and Sébastien Mandeng, researcher and vice-president respectively
of ADEFHO, a national human rights organization based in Douala that provides
legal defense to people discriminated against or attacked on the grounds of
their sexual orientation or gender identity; Joséphine Mandeng and
Claude Romuald Essoh, researchers at L’Association pour la
Liberté, la Tolérance, l’Expression et le Respect de
Personnes de Nature Indigente et Victimes D’Exclusion Sociale au Cameroun
(Alternatives-Cameroun), an organization based in Douala that works to defend
the rights of LGBT people and people living with HIV/AIDS, as well as providing
the latter with adequate treatment and care; Juliana Cano Nieto, researcher in
the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Rights Program of Human Rights
Watch (HRW) a leading and independent organization dedicated to defending and
protecting human rights throughout the globe; and Monica Mbaru, Africa Regional
Program Coordinator for the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights
Commission (IGLHRC), a leading international organization dedicated to human
rights advocacy on behalf of people who experience discrimination or abuse on
the basis of their actual or perceived sexual orientation, gender identity or
expression.

Researchers interviewed 45 self-identified gay and bisexual
men, lesbians, and bisexual women, and men who have sex with men and women who
have sex with women. None of the men or women interviewed identified as
transgender or transsexual, though some of them considered themselves to be
gender nonconforming. The interviews were conducted in either French or
English. Almost all interviewees requested that their real names be withheld
from the report, and therefore pseudonyms are used throughout.

In addition to victims of rights violations, researchers
spoke in the course of the investigation to 17 human rights activists,
government officials, journalists, medical doctors, and senior members of the
Catholic Church clergy.

Terminology

The report identifies interviewees by the translated
versions of the terms used by the interviewees themselves:
“homosexual,” “bisexual,” “gay,” and
“lesbian.” It also sometimes uses the term “lesbian, gay, bisexual,
and transgender,” or “LGBT.”

Derogatory terms also appear in this report. Those terms
used to verbally abuse gay men, include pédé (French slang
for homosexual, derived from pédéraste), depso, and
tata, or tapette (queer) and tantouse (auntie)—used
when referring to effeminate-looking men. Women who are perceived to be
lesbians call themselves mvoye (which means “to be good” in
Ewondo, a local language, but others also call them by pejorative terms;
lesbians perceived to be masculine are called deux-doigts
(two-fingered).

A more detailed glossary of terms is available as an
appendix to this report.

Background

Homosexuality has long been taboo in Cameroon. In 1972,
president Ahmadou Ahidjo enacted Article 347 bis of the Cameroon Penal Code by
decree, circumventing the usual debate in the National Assembly, in order to
punish “sexual relations with a person of the same sex” with
imprisonment of six months to five years and with a fine of 20,000 to 200,000
CFA francs [US$40 to 400].[9]
It is not clear how extensively the article was enforced between 1972 and 2005,
as no monitoring group consistently tracked arrests.

On May 21, 2005, police raided a nightclub in Yaoundé
and arrested thirty-two people under Article 347 bis, setting off a flurry of
official speeches, press accounts, and religious sermons against LGBT people
that continues to the present. More arrests under Article 347 bis followed.
Over the past five years, the threat of arrest and imprisonment, and general
public derision, has increased the vulnerability of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and
transgender people in virtually every sphere of their lives: at home, at work,
in the community, and on the streets. When they are arrested, gay people often
become victims of the brutality of police, prison guards, and fellow inmates. A
climate of extreme hostility toward LGBT people and those perceived as such
means that when they are the victims of attacks, inside or outside of police
custody, they have little recourse or protection.

After the May 2005 arrests, Cameroon’s Vice Prime
Minister and Minister of Justice Amadou Ali advocated the continued enforcement
of Article 347 bis and added “that positive African cultural values must
be preserved … [and] by virtue of African culture, homosexuality is not a
value accepted in Cameroonian society.”[10]

Then on December 5, 2005, a high school student named Franck
Abega killed a classmate and said it was because the boy had flirted with him.[11]
The murder, broadly covered by national and international media, seemed to
ignite an impassioned national conversation. Later that month, the Catholic
Archbishop of Yaoundé Monsignor Victor Tonyé Bakot denounced homosexuality
in his Christmas homily.[12]

The powers of money and the evil forces want to force you,
the people of God, to endorse the practice of homosexuality. Homosexuality is a
perversion; an orientation of sexuality toward eroticism that only flatters the
senses and rebels against the right reason…. Pseudo-modernity, in other
words, liberalism, should not lead the African to repudiate his or her own
opinion in favor of infamy.[13]

Shortly after this statement, newspapers like Nouvelle
Afrique, Le Messager and Le Popoli published a series of
articles outing people, commonly calling them the “faggots of the
Republic.”[14]
One article in particular stood out for Cameroonians: the newspaper L’Anecdote
published “The Top 50 Presumed Homosexuals in Cameroon,” providing
names of 50 public figures whom the newspaper deemed corrupt and whose failings
the paper curiously equated with homosexuality.[15]
The following day, the same newspaperpublished 27 additional names:
“The Complete List of Homosexuals in Cameroon.”[16]
The same newspaper invented words to describe Cameroon as an
“anusocraty”or “homocraty,”[17]
critiquing the government by crudely accusing its members of having gay sex.
The stories suggested that rich, corrupt “homosexuals” were trying
to take over the state and seize power. François Bikoro, chief editor of
L’Anecdote, wrote in an article, “[t]hey [gays] must be
officially tried and condemned if found guilty. Concomitantly, their wrongly
acquired wealth must be confiscated and returned to the public treasury.”[18]
Similar stories that followed in other papers depicted lesbian women as
“mistresses,”“madams,” and “grazers of
young girls’ asses,” who went about “sexually dominating
women.”[19]

The government made some effort to defend itself from the
media storm. In his annual Youth Day speech on February 10, 2006, President
Paul Biya called on the media and others to respect people’s right to
privacy.

It is not acceptable that based on uncontrolled rumor, we
allow, as was recently the case, speculation on the virtues and vices of
others. This breaches their rights to privacy and their reputation….

I therefore appeal to the spirit of responsibility, to the
wisdom of communicators, and to journalists to respect the rules of ethics of
their noble profession and henceforth respect the principles of propriety
inherent to any civilized society.[20]

Biya did not specifically mention the attacks on public
figures purported to be gay or lesbian, but his speech was understood as a
warning to the community.

In subsequent months, it was not the public figures in the
papers who were arrested under Article 347 bis, but ordinary people: university
students, small-scale craftsmen, skilled laborers, unskilled workers in hotels
and restaurants, and the unemployed. On June 7, 2006, police arrested four
young women in Douala, after the grandmother of one of the women tipped them
off that they were lesbians; each was sentenced to three years of probation.[21]
Between July and August 2007, police detained nine men in Douala and two in
Yaoundé.[22]
The most recent arrest at the time of the writing of this report occurred on
March 29, 2010, when immigration police detained three men, including an
Australian citizen, who were simply talking in the lobby of a hotel in Douala.
According to the detainees, the police, acting on a tip, told the Australian
they suspected he was having sex with the other men.[23]

Article 347 bis is not the only law used to target people on
the basis of presumed sexual orientation or sexual conduct. For instance,
Article 346 of the Penal Code, which criminalizes “indecency to minors
between sixteen and twenty-one”[24]
is sometimes aimed at young people in that range of age who have consensual
homosexual sex. In a 2007 report, Alternatives-Cameroun found that in the
previous 10 years in Douala alone, 78 people had been imprisoned under Article
347 bis for “homosexuality” or under Article 346 for
“indecency with a minor.” This research also proved that police
used Article 346 to clamp down on people perceived as gay or lesbian without
even considering the age of the supposed perpetrator, and whether he or she had
reached the age of consent.[25]

It can be extremely
difficult to track the impact of criminalization on lesbians and bisexual
women. However, researchers for this report encountered women who said they had
been sexually assaulted by neighbors and supposed friends and beaten and
rejected by family members in what appeared to be acts of hate related to their
sexual orientation or gender expression.

The enforcement of criminal laws against sex with members of
the same sex can pose potential health hazards. In 2008, Cameroon presented a
report that assured the United Nations General Assembly Special Session
(UNGASS) on HIV/AIDS that it did not have “laws, regulations or policies
that presented obstacles to HIV prevention treatment and care of vulnerable
subpopulations.”[26]
The government also claimed to have included populations most at risk of HIV
transmission in policy design and programming. MSM and WSW are at greater risk
of HIV/AIDS transmission, however Cameroon does not have any policies that
include either group as vulnerable populations. It does not keep statistics on
HIV prevalence among LGBT people, or records about their knowledge or behavior
related to HIV/AIDS transmission.[27]
Alternatives-Cameroun and ADEFHO have also found in their work that
criminalizing homosexual conduct has a chilling effect upon people’s
access to public health services and a grave impact on the efficacy of the
HIV/AIDS prevention and outreach strategies they implement.[28]

Cameroonian and international organizations have called on
the government to decriminalize consensual sexual acts between adults of the
same sex. Shortly after the May 2005 arrests, the UN WGAD found Article 347 bis
unlawful and called on Cameroon to amend its domestic law criminalizing
homosexual conduct and bring it in line with international legal standards.[29]
During Cameroon’s Universal Periodic Review in December 2008, the United
Nations (UN) Human Rights Council recommended that homosexual conduct be
decriminalized. Alternatives-Cameroun submitted a petition for
decriminalization with more than 1,500 signatures of Cameroonians to the
National Assembly in November 2009, however it has taken no action on the
issue. In the May 2010 session of the African Commission on Human and
People’s Rights, Cameroonian and international organizations called on
the commission to pressure Cameroon into decriminalizing consensual sexual acts
between adults of the same sex.

After Cameroon’s periodic report to the UN Human
Rights Committee on August 4, 2010, the committee issued a recommendation to
Cameroon's government to end social prejudice and stigmatization against LGBT
people and to guarantee that public health programs have "universal reach
and ensure universal access to HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment, care and
support." The Committee also recommended decriminalizing homosexual
conduct between consenting adults.[30]
Cameroon did not accept the recommendation and has recently denied the
existence of violence against the LGBT community. On July 8, 2010, a few days
before Cameroon reported to the UN Human Rights Committee, news outlets quoted
Issa Tchiroma, Cameroon's communications minister, responding to the case of a
gay Cameroonian man seeking asylum in the United Kingdom, by assuring that
"[n]o homosexual is persecuted in Cameroon."[31]
This report shows that Tchiroma’s statement was wrong.

Cameroon’s refusal to eliminate the prohibition of
homosexual conduct from its Penal Code contradicts the terms of its own
domestic law, which mandates that “provisions of criminal law shall be
subject to the rules of international law and to all treaties duly promulgated
and published.”[32]
Its refusal to decriminalize consensual sexual activity between adults of the
same sex amounts to a threat to the basic rights of an entire group of
Cameroonians.

Criminalizing Presumed Identities

In September 2009, 27-year-old Hervé faced trial not
for something he had done, but for who he is. He was arrested by police
officers who accused him of being a homosexual. Researchers for this report
interviewed him in court before his trial proceedings and under the watchful
eyes of a police officer who soon slapped handcuffs on Hervé’s
bony wrists, as though he posed a physical threat. That day, during
Hervé’s trial, the judge called the charge
“homosexuality,” making clear that Hervé offended by his
very identity, not by his behavior. This was the second time he faced trial
under Article 347 bis.

Hervé had been
previously arrested in July 2007 in Douala. He told researchers about that
first arrest, when again, police detained him simply because they believed him
to be a homosexual:

It was around 7:30 a.m. Two men with SWAT [Special Weapons
and Tactics] team uniforms barged into my house. They were with a friend of
mine with whom I previously had a relationship. They showed me an arrest
warrant with approximately 40 names. I was one of them. I asked why they were
arresting me. The only response was, “You will know when we get there.”

They took me to Bonaberi Police Station [in Douala]. On the
way, they insulted me and hit me with a baton. When we arrived, they said I was
there for homosexuality and pushed me into a cell. I shared the cell with four
other men. Police told me they were also there because they were faggots.[33]

A prosecutor accused Hervé and the four other men,
including a Nigerian citizen, of homosexual conduct. In April 2008, the judge
dropped the charges against Hervé and the others due to insufficient
evidence.[34]
Still, the allegations of homosexuality stemming from the arrest continue to
follow Hervé. “Everyone in my neighborhood calls me
‘faggot’ and says I am a ‘homo,’” he told
researchers. And the 2007 arrest cast suspicion that may have led to
Hervé’s subsequent arrest in 2009. In the latter, the judge
dismissed the case, but that did little to diminish Hervé’s
constant fear. Hervé told us in a follow-up interview after his release,
“[t]hey [the police] can use this, as they have before, to detain me and
harass me at any time,” he said. “It’s come to the point that
I am afraid that even a casual conversation with another man could lead to
another arrest and possible prosecution.”[35]

When researchers spoke to 26-year-old Christian in 2009, he
vividly recalled the May 21, 2005 police raid on a nightclub, when police
arrested him among 31 other people and accused them of violating Article 347
bis. At the time, he was studying computer science, but after the arrest, the
university forced him to drop out. Now he holds an informal job in the hotel
business. Police simply said they were arresting gay people, Christian
recalled; there was no discussion of specific same-sex sexual acts.

We thought it was a usual ID check. Policemen came to the
nightclub. They said they were looking for someone called Arthur Zogo. No one
knew who they were talking about, but still they arrested us. On our way to the
police station, the police officers insulted us and they beat us with batons on
our heads and bodies. They kept saying they were going to burn us for being
dirty pédés [faggots]. They took us to the [Nlongkak]
police station in downtown Yaoundé and told us they were looking for the
head of a network of homosexuals in Cameroon. This happened on a Sunday
evening.

The next morning, they began to question us about our
homosexuality, and on Tuesday, they took us to Channel Two and to Cameroon
Radio and Television (CRTV). They paraded us on the news saying the police had
dismantled a network of homosexuals. They kept us in jail without access to a
lawyer for 13 days. On June 13, 2005, the 11 of us were transferred from the
police station to the Kondengui Central Prison.

For 11 days, we were
sent back and forth between the legal department and prison. No one talked to
us, and we never saw a lawyer. We spent another three months without any
information about our case. It was not until local groups managed to get us a
lawyer—Alice Nkom—that our process moved along.[36]

When Christian was arrested in the group of 32 people,
police separated him and two of his friends from the rest of the detainees.
Police insulted and beat them. Christian, who was then 22, spent nine months in
pre-trial detention at Kondengui Central Prison. He was ultimately one of nine
people in the group convicted of violating Article 347 bis, based on testimony
from one witness who said Christian and his two friends were gay.

Lawyers who defend people accused of violating Article 347
bis told researchers for this report that the police often act on flimsy
evidence of homosexual identity, and no evidence at all of acts of same-sex
sex. Alice Nkom is the president of ADEFHO and a well-known Douala lawyer. She
defended Christian, whose case is mentioned above, and she frequently defends
other people arrested under Article 347 bis. She said, “[p]olice detain
people without any objective evidence that proves that these men were caught in
‘flagrant homosexuality.’ Still they are arrested and sentenced, or
are kept in prison for months without charge.”[37]

Even a public official told researchers for this report that
though he supports Article 347 bis, he believes it is being enforced too
broadly—against homosexual identity in general. “If the community
wants purity and normal behaviors, then legislators legislate on it,”
said Chemuta Banda, the chief commissioner of Cameroon’s independent
Human Rights Commission, explaining popular approval for the law. “Our
society has acted according to natural law. A country has opted for the purity
of its citizens.”[38]
Yet Banda said he believes the article should be enforced in extremely limited
ways. “Only if people are caught doing something [sexual] outside the
privacy of their home, or are found in flagrante in public, should
police arrest them for homosexuality,” Banda said.[39]
He added that sexual acts between adults of the same sex in the privacy of
their homes should not fall under Article 347 bis, and people should not be
arrested or charged on suspicion of a general homosexual identity or
presumptions that they engage in sexual acts with members of their own sex. He
said that the National Human Rights Commission, a public institution, would act
in cases where police ill-treat those they detain under Article 347 bis:
“If we see any homosexual arrested under this law being tortured, we will
say something.”[40]

Lawyers who defend
detainees under Article 347 bis noted that the article was never even debated
and put to a vote, since it was included in the Cameroon Penal Code through a
presidential decree without review by the National Assembly. Furthermore, they
said they consider its broad application a violation of other Cameroonian and
international laws. “This law is unconstitutional,” said Michel
Togue, a well-known human rights attorney.[41]
The Constitution of the Republic of Cameroon says, “[T]he State shall
guarantee all citizens of either sex the rights and freedoms set forth in the
Preamble of the Constitution.”[42] It also states that Cameroon
“shall ensure the equality of all citizens before the law.”[43] Michel Togue and Alice Nkom stated that
these protections should include LGBT people. According to Nkom,
“[j]udges would be justified in refusing to apply the article because of
the violations that happen.”[44]

Yet opinions vary, and some support the law. A judge told
researchers for this report that he saw no problem with the broad way Article
347 bis is applied, despite Article 45 of the Cameroonian Constitution stating
that treaties override national laws that breach them.

We are in Africa, and our traditions are also against
homosexuality. General opinion is against homosexuality. It is an offence in
the Penal Code and so I judge it. If this is against international conventions
then we must change the law. This is up to the legislator, not to us as judges.
Until the law changes, we will continue to apply it.[45]

To a lesser extent, police have also arrested women on the
grounds of their perceived sexual orientation under Article 347 bis.
Alternatives-Cameroun and ADEFHO reported that on June 7, 2006, four women were
arrested under the article and sentenced to a three-year suspended prison
sentence and a fine.[46]

Researchers also heard the account of 33-year-old Linda, a
self-identified lesbian working as a secretary, arrested in 2005 under Article
346 for “indecency with a minor,” though in fact her partner was an
adult. She told researchers,

One night, at around 4:30 a.m., my girlfriend’s
family came to my house. They arrived in a taxi with three police officers and
dragged me to the Mimboman police station. We had been living together for
about two years, and we were both over 21. Regardless, the police kept me there
for almost four days. They kept saying that I was disturbing this child, but no
one explicitly mentioned anything about my lesbianism, and I, of course, did
not bring it up. Meanwhile, my girlfriend had escaped and was nowhere to be
found. Police told me I would not be set free until she appeared. I called her
and convinced her to come to the police station. When she arrived, her family
tied her up and took her [to their] home. She later told me they tied her [up]
for a week. Police released me hours after that.[47]

Researchers for this report did not find accounts of lesbian
and bisexual women arrested after 2007, but the possibility of such detentions
cannot be discounted.

The police continue to detain people on the basis of their
presumed identity, rather than for any specific act. Prosecutors appear not to
feel compelled even to build evidence against the detainees; one witness who
claims a person is a homosexual can be enough to sway a judge. Cameroonian
authorities have moved from punishing specific acts toward defining and
marginalizing entire identities based on those acts.

Leveraging the Threat
of Reporting Homosexuality

Other people take advantage of the fact that police are
willing to arrest someone based on the vaguest of accusations that the person
is homosexual. Criminals can blackmail or falsely accuse LGBT people and simply
deflect the interest of the police by accusing them of homosexuality when
questioned. Friends, family, and acquaintances can blatantly extort money or
favors from LGBT people with the threat of reporting them to the police.

On March 28, 2009, 22-year-old Serge was swimming in a lake
near the Douala airport when others present accused him of homosexuality and police
officers arrested him. Serge told researchers,

I was swimming on my own, but there were other people
swimming there as well. A group of thugs arrived and tried to steal my money. I
fought back. When the police arrived, the thugs told the other guys in the lake
to say that I was a homosexual. They took us all to the police station. Police
detained me and accused me of being a homosexual. They released the thugs.

Police said I had
committed “flagrant homosexuality.” They stripped me naked but for
my underwear and locked me in a prison cell for approximately one week. A
police officer would come and beat me repeatedly with a baton.[48]

Police arrested 26-year-old Henri on November 18, 2009 under
Article 347 bis. His lawyer told him the only evidence against him was an
accusation. Henri described to researchers the circumstances leading up to his
arrest,

I was having a drink with a neighbor in a bistro near the
[Douala] airport at a place called Village. He then invited me over to his
house. We spent a couple of hours together, and [then] he left, leaving me
locked [involuntarily] in his house. A couple of hours later, he returned with
three of his friends. They asked for money, threatening me to take me to the
police for homosexuality. I refused, so they dragged me to the police station.
My neighbor told the police I was a homosexual and so the police threw me in
jail.[49]

Police officers beat and kicked Henri so that he would
confess to homosexual acts. He remained in police custody for a month and a half,
before his appearance in a court in Douala on December 28, 2009. He was still
awaiting trial at the time of the writing of this report, though the
prosecution presented no further evidence against him. The police never
investigated the attempt to kidnap and extort money from Henri. Simply by
levying allegations of homosexuality, perpetrators of serious crimes can escape
justice.

The Justice System: Prejudiced and Unfair

Researchers heard allegations of arrests without warrant and
detention in police custody and in prison without charge. In all the cases
researched for this report in which people were charged, the courts denied
detainees bail. As is common in Cameroon, in general, the trials took place
months after the initial arrests, causing those arrested to languish in
pre-trial detention in police custody and then in prison during that
period.

In the meantime, detainees were ill-treated by the police,
who inflicted beatings with batons on people’s heads, limbs and soles of
their feet. Some victims had to undergo forced anal
examinations—allegedly to prove that homosexual sexual activity occurred,
though anal penetration can generally not be proved by this kind of
examination—and others were threatened with this possibility. In all
cases, the detainees suffered violations of their fundamental human rights.

Arbitrary Detentions
and Due Process Violations

The Code of Penal Procedure of Cameroon was entered into
force in June 2007. It states that police can only perform searches and
seizures when they have previously obtained a warrant from a judge. The
exception is when a misdemeanor—such as homosexual conduct—is
“in the course of being committed or … [has] just been
committed.”[50]
When arrested in flagrante delicto, the person will “be brought by
the police before the Prosecutor who shall proceed to check his identity,
interrogate him summarily and, if he decides to prosecute, shall place him into
temporary detention or release him on bail.”[51]

Once in police custody, the suspect “shall immediately
be informed of the allegations against him, and shall be treated humanely both
morally and materially,” says the procedural code.[52]
Police can only detain a person for up to 48 hours. During the detention period
a person has the right to “be visited by his lawyer, members of his
family, and by any other person following up his treatment while in
detention.”[53]
After 48 hours, the individual must be charged or released and if pre-trial
detention is requested a bail hearing must be held in front of a judge.[54]

In the cases documented
below, police arrested people in the privacy of their homes, in many cases
without a warrant. In other instances, police detained people in situations
where there was no evidence that sexual acts between members of the same sex
had taken place.

On January 20, 2007, police detained 25-year-old Armand, a
university student, in his home in Douala. Said Armand,

My 18-year-old friend and his father came to my home,
accompanied by two armed policemen. I was there with my parents and my younger
brothers. My mom opened the door. When she asked the officers who they were
looking for, they replied, “the faggot.” The police arrested me and
took me to the police station of Bonabéri [a neighborhood in Douala]. At
the station in one of the offices, they made me undress and put me in a cell
with three other men and a woman.

I was scared and just kept repeating to myself, “A
man is born to suffer and prison is a way.” They opened an investigation
against me. The police officer started asking me questions, but I refused to
answer without the presence of a lawyer or a member of my family. When my
mother came, in her presence, the officer resumed the questioning. He said,
“They say that you sleep with men and you offer them money.” I looked
at him astonished, and my mom just stared at me blankly.

During the time that I spent in the police station, other
cellmates and the police officers insulted me and beat me. A police officer hit
me with his baton on the soles of my feet and the others just used their fists.
They kept calling me “faggot.” Four days later, they transferred me
to New Bell Prison. In the car on my way to the prison, the policemen kept
beating me and said I deserved this treatment.[55]

Police officials never gave Armand access to a lawyer and
his family could not afford to engage one. He spent a week in prison, though
the police showed no evidence that he had committed a crime. The police
insulted him for being gay and punished him for this with threats and beatings.
Armand ended up spending nine months in a Douala prison pending trial. In
court, said Armand, “The prosecutor told me that an unknown person, who I
believe was my friend or his father, told the police authorities that I was a
homosexual. That sufficed.” No other evidence was produced and Armand was
not able to challenge the witness, contrary to Article 14 of ICCPR. The judge
sentenced him to two years in prison, of which he served a year and a half.

Most recently, on March 26, 2010, police detained
André, a member of Alternatives-Cameroun, and two friends, one an
Australian citizen, in the lobby of a hotel. André told members of
Alternatives-Cameroun,

Two friends invited me for lunch at the Meridien hotel in
Douala. Around 11 a.m., they joined me at the lobby of the hotel where I was
waiting for them. Soon after we greeted each other we were taken by men in
civilian clothes who identified as border police. We were taken to the police
station and were locked in a cell. On several occasions I was interviewed by
the head police officer, who told me I was not his target. He told me to sign
[a statement saying] that I had had sex with the Australian. When I refused, he
threatened to send me to Douala’s central prison.[56]

Police released André and his friends three days
later. Others arrested by the police told researchers they did not dare start a
complaint against the police because they were scared of the consequences.
Others who we asked about initiating complaints told us they did not have faith
in the system. Researchers met with the human rights commissioner for the
southwest region of the country, who put it bluntly, “There is no
mechanism available to hold police officers accountable for human rights
violations. Three years I have been here and I cannot give you a concrete
example where a police officer who participated in a rights abuse has been
charged or even suspended.”[57]

The stigma attached to homosexual sex in Cameroon imputes a
generalized guilt to those who are presumed to be a homosexual. Thirty-six-year
old Michel, who now works for a sexual and reproductive rights organization,
remembers the day he appeared before a judge in March 2006 to be tried under
Article 347 bis.

At the hearing, the judge said we should be released
because there was no evidence of our crime. That Friday we thought we were
free! But the weekend passed and we were not released. On Monday we were taken
to the legal department. They told us the prosecutor charged us again and
refused to let us go and so off we went to prison again. It was torture.[58]

The prosecutor refused to
sign the release forms, insisting they should be retried. This other trial
never took place, and Michel remained in prison three more months before being
released.

Michel’s case is one of the few where the lawyers
filed a complaint. The result was a 2006 review of the case by the UN WGAD.
Even before an international body, Cameroon argued that its actions were
appropriate enforcement of Article 347 bis. “[Homosexual] practices are
against the law in place and against what the Cameroonian society considers
good morals,”[59]
Cameroonian officials said. The government failed to respond to the
WGAD’s concerns with the issues of ill-treatment and violations of the
detainees’ due process rights.

The UN WGAD found that the detention of Michel and 10 other
men was arbitrary on the basis of the procedure and the re-arrest. It also
found the law itself was contrary to Articles 17 and 26 of the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICPPR), to which Cameroon is party; it
recommended changing the law.[60]
Despite this decision, Cameroon did not hold anyone—not police, not
prison officials, and not members of the judiciary—accountable for
subjecting the men to discriminatory treatment. It did not remove the
convictions from the men’s records or change the law.

Police also use detainees to inform on others so they may
continue the chain of arrests. Hervé’s friend later confessed to
him that he accused him under pressure from the police.

The police arrested him
and threatened to convict him for stealing if he did not give the names of
homosexuals he knew. He refused, but police started to beat him, and they did
so badly enough that they forced out a confession, saying that I was gay in
order [for him] to be released in exchange [for me]. That was enough for the
police and his family to come after me and for him to go home.[61]

Most men we interviewed who were accused of homosexuality
had never been imprisoned before, yet they were all held under pre-trial
detention for months but were locked up with convicted criminals. The Standard
Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, adopted by the UN in 1957,
requires that pre-trial and post-trial detention be separate.[62]

Intrusive and Inhuman
Examinations

Researchers for this report found that police order
intrusive and inhuman anal examinations to supposedly prove a history of
homosexual sex. In August 2007, a deputy police commander in Yaoundé
appointed a forensic doctor “to allegedly conduct exams of two young men
in order to confirm or refute their presumed qualities as homosexuals.”[63]
Vincent Minokoa Nga, the commissioner heading the investigation into
Hervé’s 2009 arrest, ordered the forensic doctors to carry out an
anal examination. The justification for anal examinations may be based on one
of two misconceptions: one rationale stems from the antiquated, bad science
that believes in the bodily deformity of the “perverted homosexual”
as evidence of the prohibited act; the other stems from the misconception that
anal penetration leaves bodily evidence such as deformity or scarring.[64]

In an e-mail communication to Human Rights Watch, Dr. Lorna
Martin, the chief specialist and head of the Division of Forensic Medicine and
Toxicology at the University of Cape Town, said that “it is impossible to
detect chronic anal penetration; the only time the [forensic anal] examination
could be of any use is for acute non-consensual anal penetration, when certain
injuries may be seen.”[65]
In addition, in a communication with IGLHRC, Dr. Vincent Lacopino, senior
medical advisor for Physicians for Human Rights and one of the principal
drafters of UN Manual on the Effective Investigation and Documentation of
Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment
(otherwise known as the Istanbul Protocol) agrees that “forensic anal
examinations have no value, whatsoever, in identifying consensual anal
intercourse.”[66]

The intrusive and invasive nature of the exam may show an
intention to punish and/or humiliate the person examined.[67]
When state authorities carry out such acts, they may be considered to rise to
the level of cruel and inhuman treatment—a violation not only of the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) but of the
Convention Against Torture, to which Cameroon acceded in 1987.

From the moment people are arrested under Article 347 bis,
they face violence as they move through flawed and unfair criminal proceedings
that will leave them with memories of abuse and ongoing fear.

Abuses in Detention: A Constant Reminder of Who You
Are

In prison, our identity
followed us everywhere…. If I left that cell, people said I was going to
flirt with others, if I went to the toilet at night, the prison guards accused
me of wanting to go have sex with someone.

—Michel, Yaoundé, September 21, 2009

Researchers interviewed men in prison for homosexuality in
Buea, Douala, Ebolowa, and Yaoundé. Detainees provided accounts of
beatings and ill-treatment while in police custody, and gave accounts of
regular physical and verbal violence from both prison guards and other inmates.[68]
Afraid of the consequences, interviewees did not file complaints against the
police. In prison, some interviewees tried filing complaints with prison
authorities, but the authorities failed to investigate and did not respond.

Other prisoners reported an attitude of disgust and disdain
for homosexuality. Researchers for this report asked 15 inmates in Ebolowa
Prison what they thought about homosexuals. “Homosexuality is an
abominable practice,” said one young man. “It’s pure
sorcery,” said another.[69]
One inmate said, “If I found out my son was gay, I would most certainly
beat him and take him to a priest to get exorcised.”[70]
When prison authorities single out inmates for presumed homosexuality in an
environment of prejudice, fear and violence, it seems to virtually guarantee
abuse.

Twenty-three-year-old Bertrand explained that police had
arrested him without warrant or explanation, as required by Cameroonian law, in
July 2007 at his hair salon in the Douala neighborhood of Carrefour des Billes.
Only when he arrived at the Bonaberi police station, he said, did he discover
that he had been arrested for homosexuality. Then the abuse began, to force a
confession. He said:

When I got to the station, a police officer made me undress
and started to insult me. He insulted me about my sexuality and also beat me
with a baton all over my body. Two officers asked me for 100,000 francs
[US$200] as a “cell fee.” I had no money. They beat me almost every
day and kept forcing me to admit I was a homosexual. I was forced to sign a
report where they accused me of homosexuality. After two weeks of this
treatment, they transferred me to New Bell Prison.[71]

Bertrand’s treatment at the prison was also abusive.
It is still difficult for him to discuss what he endured at the hands of prison
guards and fellow inmates. He explained,

When you arrive at the prison, the head of the prisoners
makes you hold up a slab of cement until you tell him the crime that you
committed. The prison guards were standing there looking as they did this to
me, but said nothing. When I told him [the head of the prisoners] that I was
there for homosexuality, he threatened me and told me I would be his wife,
meaning he would use me for sex. He later did.

We [gays] were kept in the same cell, with another 40 to 50
inmates, but we were the only ones who were rarely allowed outside. Everyone in
the prison knew we were accused of homosexuality.

That was the first of many degrading situations. When my
friends came to visit, prisoners would call us “ugly women” and
“pédés” [faggots] all the time. They would say
I should not be alive. Prison guards would hit me and throw water at me
constantly. I was also repeatedly beaten by other prisoners. One time, a group
of prisoners even tried to rape me with a stick.

I couldn't leave my cell to get fresh air because I was
afraid the big boys would threaten and hurt me. Some of the guards would see
what was happening and just make fun of me as well. They kept saying I deserved
to go to hell. I really could not leave my cell, I was so scared. It was like
being in a prison within a prison. And even in the cell, I would continuously
find feces or urine all over my mattress.

After these repeated attacks, I wrote a letter to the
prison authorities with other friends also there accused of homosexuality and
being treated in a similar way. They [the prison authorities] never responded.[72]

When 27-year-old Marc arrived at Douala’s New Bell
Prison in December 2006, he heard a chorus of men yelling, “Motive,
motive, motive.” [In French, they said, “Motif, motif,
motif.”] As is standard practice in the three prisons researchers
visited, the prison guards and then the “chief” inmate asked what
his crime was.[73]
Marc was scared and refused to tell them, but by the time he reached the cell,
the news was out. Like most men we interviewed who were accused of
homosexuality, Marc had never been imprisoned before. Regardless, like all the
men we interviewed, he was held in pre-trial detention with convicted criminals.[74]
The Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, adopted by the UN in
1957, requires that pre-trial and post-trial detention be separate.[75]
As will be seen below, in cases of people targeted for homosexuality, this
becomes even more important.

Marc narrated his experience,

I was placed in Cell Number one. The chief of the cell,
another prisoner, strip-searched me. He made me bend down and checked my anus,
looking for money. When he was doing this, he whispered in my ear, “Since
you had sex with other men, then we shall also have sex with you.” My
heart started to beat faster. I had to give him money to protect me, but even
then, the insults and threats did not end.

When my friends came to visit me, the other prisoners would
insult us. “Your time is today, their time will be tomorrow, pédés
[faggots]!” they would scream. They threatened us, saying they would rape
us with sticks! I tried to complain to the prison guards, but none of them
listened.[76]

The police arrested 28-year-old Samuel in Yaoundé in
the early morning of August 16, 2008. His landlord reported him for
homosexuality to the police. Police officers took him without a warrant to the
Nlongkak Police Station, and then on August 31, 2008, transferred him to
Kondengui Prison, a place that Samuel remembered with bitterness:

I was in prison for three months before seeing a judge.
During this time, prison guards insulted me; they called me and my friends
“pédés [faggots]”…. Sometimes at night,
prisoners would throw us outside the cell because they said that gays are
dirty. We sent a letter to the prison authorities, but never got a response.
The beatings and cursing continued until I was released.[77]

Juveniles arrested for homosexuality rarely have the
protections to which they are entitled as minors. Michel, whose own experiences
are described earlier in this report, also recalled the abuses he witnessed
against his young friend, Christian, 17 at the time of his arrest.

From the moment we went into prison, the prisoners beat
Christian with stones. Prisoners took advantage of him sexually because he was
young. The guards first placed him in a cell with older prisoners, though he
was under 18. Prison guards told us he would not be sent to the cell with the
minors because he would turn other children into homosexuals. It wasn’t
until the lawyer Nkom started to defend us that they moved him to the cell for
younger people, but it was not long before they transferred him back with the
adults.

We complained to the
prison superintendent, as soon as he [Christian] was put in a cell with older
prisoners, but nothing ever happened. All were formalities.[78]

The Beijing Rules provide that “[j]uveniles under
detention pending trial shall be entitled to all rights and guarantees of the
Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners adopted by the United
Nations.”[79]
They also state that “[j]uveniles under detention pending trial shall be
kept separate from adults and shall be detained in a separate institution or in
a separate part of an institution also holding adults.”[80]

The only way to avoid prison threats and violence, according
to the interviewees, is to prevent people from identifying you as gay. Armand
was one of the few interviewees who did not face abuse in prison. He said he
was lucky.

At New Bell, they initially assigned me to Cell Number One.
Already aware of the reason for my arrest, another prisoner acting as cell
leader—from my same tribe—asked me questions, provided advice, and
informed me that Cell Number One was not safe for me because the inmates were
aware of the grounds for my indictment and they would hurt me.

The head of Cell Number One helped me to be placed in Cell
Number Eight. This cell had less hardened criminals and he believed I would be
safer there. The prisoner acting as secretary for the cell was there on charges
of homosexuality, so when he learned that I was there for the same reason, he
helped me to hide the reason for my incarceration. That saved me. Two months
later, the guards decided I would be in charge of discipline in the cell. This
position protected me.[81]

Disciplinary Action and
Abuse for Same-Sex Sex in Prison

Ebolowa Prison Director Lazare Banoho and National School of
Penitentiary Administration Director Immaculate Fonkem told researchers that if
same-sex sexual activity is suspected in prison, officials should launch an
Article 347 bis investigation. However, neither of them knew of any such
investigation or of cases of inmates whose terms were extended as a result.
Meanwhile, inmates interviewed for this report who were accused of homosexual
activity while in prison said they had been held in isolation and subjected to
corporal punishment. According to Hervé, “People found in flagrant
homosexuality are put in solitary confinement with chains on their feet for up
to a month.”[82] Other
interviewees confirmed his statement.

Twenty-four-year old Francis told researchers for this
report that he witnessed guards abusing prisoners found having sex.

I saw when they found
him. He was having sex with another man in a cell. When the guards caught them
they gave them the usual treatment. They started to beat them up. The prison
guards undressed them, beat them in front of all of us, and put them in
solitary confinement. This happened a couple of months ago. When they came out,
about 20 days later, they [prison guards] chained them by arms and feet. One of
them [prisoners] is still chained. The prison guards are asking him for money
to remove the shackles.[83]

Prison guards at Yaoundé Central Prison accused
26-year-old Thomas of having sex with another man and punished him to 20 days
in solitary confinement. He told researchers,

It was at night. I was inside the cell of another prisoner.
The head of the cell arrived and said we were having sex, but we weren’t.
It was around 8:30 p.m. The guards sent me to the disciplinary cell for 20
days. The cell is a small room, two meters by two meters. It has no light and
no toilet. You don’t even have a mattress and have to sleep on the floor.
I would have been left there if it were not for my lawyer, who immediately
asked the prison to let me out. I only lasted a few days, but others are not so
lucky.[84]

During the days in solitary confinement Thomas received
reduced rations of food and was not allowed to see anyone, including a doctor,
in violation of the international legal standards on the treatment of
prisoners. These standards prohibit the use of solitary confinement and
handcuffs as punishment, as well as prohibit reducing food rations and denying
access to a doctor.[85]
Extended use of these cells when combined with other punishments, such as being
stripped naked, food restrictions, and denial of access to the toilet,
constitutes a form of torture.[86]

HIV and Same-Sex
Sexuality in Prison

Both forced and voluntary sex is common among prison
inmates, but the government of Cameroon refuses to acknowledge either. It also
fails to protect inmates from rape and denies them access to condoms in prison
because prison officials fear condom distribution will encourage same-sex
activity—a criminal act under Article 347 bis and specifically prohibited
in prison.

Denying that homosexuality in prison exists, one state
official said, “[t]he only thing needed to prevent sex from happening in
prison is separating women from men.”[87] Despite official denial, overwhelming evidence from prisoners and
some prison officers suggests that sex takes place in the prisons. A prison
guard told us, “homosexuality [meaning same-sex sex] is something that
happens in Cameroon outside the prisons. It also happens in prison. There are
only men living together for years. It is natural that men have sex with other
men in prison.”[88]

Twenty-seven-year-old Alexandre spent 18 months in a prison
in Douala. He was harassed from the very first day he arrived and threatened
with rape by several inmates.

I spent nine months in prison before getting to a courtroom
to see a judge. One night another inmate who had beaten me on several occasions
and had threatened to rape me demanded to have sex with me. I was scared and
could only respond by asking for how much [money]. He said, “I
won’t give you money, but I will feed you and protect you from others who
want to rape you.” I needed the protection, so I agreed.[89]

The denial of the occurrence of same-sex sex in prison has
serious consequences, including the lack of protection and redress for rape
victims. Alexandre did not complain about the rape because he feared
persecution for same-sex sexual activity. Additionally, Alexandre and other
interviewees who were raped or coerced into having sex in prison, as well as
those who had consensual intercourse, did so without protection because condoms
were prohibited. Dr. Rosad Njateng, a prison doctor based at Buea, explained to
researchers that he could not provide condoms to inmates because it would
encourage homosexual activity in violation of Article 347 bis.

In Cameroonian prisons, there are no conjugal visits, so
there is no need to give out condoms. If you give condoms to prisoners, you
will encourage sodomy. The law prohibits homosexuality, and I can’t, as a
man of law, go against it, so I cannot give out condoms to encourage
homosexuality. It is also common for women to have sexual relationships, but we
can’t do anything about this.[90]

Inmate members of the HIV/AIDS committee at the Ebolowa
Prison confirmed that prison authorities prohibit the distribution of condoms
because, they say, it would “promote homosexuality.” A member of
the HIV/AIDS Committee added, “[W]e are only allowed to use condoms to
teach about their use for when inmates are released.”[91]
This was confirmed by the Director of the Ebolowa prison, Lazare Banoho, who
said that since “detainees do not have sex, we do not need to distribute
condoms in prison.”[92]
The only woman on the HIV/AIDS committee told researchers the same held true
for women in prison.

On these grounds, the Cameroonian government has also
decided not to conduct any study on HIV prevalence among men who have sex with
men, including in prison, despite HIV prevalence in Cameroon being
significantly higher than in the general population.[93]

In its 2008 report to the
United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on HIV and AIDS,
Cameroon laid claim to a strategy to promote information, education, and
communications for “vulnerable subpopulations,” including prison
inmates.[94] The government report
discussed risk, stigma and discrimination reduction; and HIV education; condom
promotion; testing; and counseling in prison. Yet, researchers for this report
observed that in practice these policies are not implemented in prisons, where
men have sex with men.

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS)
identified the prevalence of unprotected sex as one of various factors that
make frequent prisons important venues for HIV transmission; others include
overcrowding and male rape.[95]
Cameroonian prisons have all of these, thus making them a high-risk environment
for the contraction and spread of HIV/AIDS. The criminalization of same-sex
sexual activity should be decriminalized. Whether it is or not, condoms need to
be distributed in prison. International organizations—including the WHO,
UNODC, and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS)—all
recommend that condoms be provided to prisoners.[96]

Eric, arrested in the
2005 police crackdown on homosexuality under Article 347 bis, was raped in
prison. He died of AIDS-related complications a few days after his release.
Michel—a member of Alternatives-Cameroun and a close friend to Eric who
was imprisoned with him remembers with frustration, “[w]e tried to get
Eric tested for HIV, but it was impossible. We had no money and they did not
test us in prison.”[97] The inability to be tested
prevents people from being diagnosed and treated.[98]
Testing is sporadic and when available, prisoners have to pay for it.

The head doctor at the Ebolowa Prison doctor said,

Officially, the tests are to be free, but in reality they
are not. If we need to test a prisoner, we have to send them to the hospital,
and they will have to pay for the exam. This is because we stopped having
HIV/AIDS testing kits for the provinces two years ago. For instance, in
December 2008, I had 40 testing kits left for the prison, now I have none and
we have 400-plus prisoners.[99]

Long-Term Impact of
Imprisonment for Homosexuality

Arrests of Cameroonians who identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual,
or transgender have had a detrimental effect the personal relationships and
work prospects of those arrested.

Christian, 22 at the time of his detention, remembers,

When I came out of prison, I was very weak. My family did
not want to see me. They were in shock that I could be a homosexual and a
prisoner. They were traumatized, and they doubly rejected me. I was studying
computer science before the arrest, but I could not continue. I started to do small
work in hotels but they did not last long. I am currently unemployed.[100]

For Bertrand, who spent
seven months in prison under Article 347 bis, the stigma of being publicly
accused of committing homosexual acts and the hardship caused by his inability
to contribute financially to his family during this period had a lasting
impact. “Since my return to freedom,” he says, “I am put down
by my family members who continue to disrespect me. Only my mother talks to me.
She was forced to sell everything in my salon to make ends meet in my absence,
and to be able to provide me with the little necessities when I was
incarcerated.”[101]

Social Control, Rejection, and Violence

Attacked for Appearances: Intersections of
Homophobia and Patriarchy

In Cameroon, as everywhere, appearances matter. Women are
expected to wear dresses and skirts. Men are expected to wear pants or the
traditional male dress in the region, a wide-sleeved robe called a boubou.
Flouting these expectations makes a person stand out. A person wearing particular
styles of clothing (tight jeans and T-shirts for men, or baggy jeans and hats
for women) is perceived as gay or lesbian. In effect, girls, boys, men and
women, can be condemned as much for self-expression as for homosexual acts.
Condemnation can play out as ridicule and verbal abuse and, in some cases, it
can lead to physical violence.

Women are more commonly singled out because they fail to
meet expectations for their appearances or because they engage in conduct
deemed unfeminine. This is in part because in Cameroon, the men of a family
control the intimate lives of the women of the family—lesbians and
bisexual women and girls included—in ways they do not for other men,
including gay men.[102]
Researchers found that the community also singles out men and women who are not
fulfilling the desired roles of masculinity or femininity.[103]

Verbal insults are common for those who look different.
Sonia, 31, has short, braided hair, and often dresses as she did on the day of
the interview with researchers for this report: in cargo pants, a T-shirt and a
hat. When researchers asked why people singled her out as a lesbian she
replied,

The fact that I wear shorts or pants frequently makes me a
lesbian in people’s eyes. I also play soccer, and in Cameroon, people
assume that if you are a soccer player, you are a lesbian. When we play, men
will stand around and insult us.[104]

Researchers asked her what it is like for her to be a
lesbian in the neighborhood where she lives. “It’s death in my
neighborhood,” she responded immediately.[105]
She explained,

If they find out you are gay, they will kill you. They
suspect I am, but they cannot prove it because I have a son. Regardless, the
men in the neighborhood bug me all the time. They constantly call me names.
They will try to get closer to me and if I refuse them, they will say it is
because I am a lesbian. Other people marginalize you as well. In school they
would call me a “lesbo.” Life is difficult when you are not free to
walk around and be yourself. You have to remain secluded in your little group.[106]

Danielle, 35, lives with her oldest brother and his wife.
“The guys in my neighborhood know I play soccer, and so when they see me,
they will call out, ‘lesbian!’ They also yell at me because of the
way I dress. I walk like a man and dress with pants and shirts. To men, this
confirms I am a lesbian.”[107]

Researchers witnessed how those stereotypes based on
appearances and non-compliance with societal norms of appropriate expressions
of femininity and masculinity turn into intimidation. On September 13, 2009 two
women members of Alternatives-Cameroun sat side by side watching the weekly
game organized by Alternatives-Cameroun in Douala. A young man in his
20’s approached them and insulted them. He asked them if they were boyfriend
and girlfriend, pointing to the way one of them was dressed in jeans, a T-shirt
and a baseball cap.

“I don’t tolerate lesbos in his
neighborhood,” said the man.[108]
He told them they had to leave and never to come back. Then he turned to the
rest of the players, calling them pédés (faggots).
“You don’t have the right to play in this neighborhood,” he
said. He tried to threaten everyone into giving him money, saying that if they
did not, he would tell the police. “This happens almost every
weekend,” said Carole, who organizes the matches. “We ignore them
and refuse to pay them, but it’s still intimidating.”[109]

In other cases, like that of 39-year-old Cyrille, a
journalism student in Yaoundé, the stereotyping leads to physical
violence.

I had a couple of friends come to my house. They came to
spend two weeks with me. We were sitting outside my house. A group of guys kept
staring at us calling us pédés [faggots] because one of my
friends looked very feminine. He was wearing tight jeans and a tight shirt. A
few days later, I was coming home, and the same guys that had been staring
stopped me. They demanded that I give them money. They said, “You had a
couple of white pédés [faggots] in your house so you are
also pédé [faggot] and all of you pédés
[faggots] have money … pass it on.…” I refused; one of them
slapped me. Another one took a piece of iron and hit me on the leg so hard that
the iron bent. I started to scream for help and they ran away. I went to the
hospital, but I only said I was in a fight. When I went back home, the owner of
the house [that I rented] told me I had to leave because I was a
“homo.” I never returned to the neighborhood.[110]

Attacked in the
Neighborhood

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people are
vulnerable to attack by neighbors and acquaintances who suspect them of
same-sex interest. All parties know that if the attack is reported, the victim
could be arrested under Article 347 bis.

Some gay men spoke of entrapment by neighbors and
acquaintances seeking to report them. In 2006, neighbors attacked 32-year-old
Franck, who works in a hotel in Yaoundé. He told researchers,

I made friends with another man in my neighborhood. He kept
asking me for cigarettes, so one day I invited him for a drink. We hung out
once in a while. One night he said he did not have a place to sleep and asked
if he could stay in my house. I agreed. We slept in the same bed. In the middle
of the night, he began to feel me up. At first I ignored him, but he started to
touch me and I couldn’t resist. Suddenly he jumped out of bed and said,
“I was taunting you to make sure you are a pédé!”
I froze. He ran out of the house and started to scream that I wanted to rape
him. The neighbors came out of their homes and started to beat me. They were
three or four. I can’t remember, but they would not listen to any
explanation! They threw me on the ground and continued to beat me with their
feet all over my body. They threatened to call the police. One man suggested
they should break my legs. I was appalled. I just sat there in the mud crying.

When the police arrived,
they did not arrest the other guy or any of the neighbors; the officer took me
to the police station and booked me for homosexuality. He said, “[t]he
commissioner likes these types of cases.” I denied the charge, but after
four days of beatings in the station, I confessed.[111]

Olivier, a 35-year-old
nurse who lives in the southwest Cameroonian town of Moyoka, told researchers
for this report that in early 2009, he made a date with another man. This was
the outcome:

We headed to one of our homes and started to caress one
another in the living room. The man I was with suddenly started to scream and
shouted that I wanted to have sex with him. The neighbors woke up. Three
neighbors dragged me out of the house and took me to the police station. Police
beat me in an apparent effort to extract a confession, but I refused to say
anything. I was released two weeks later.[112]

Twenty-four-year old Aline is the youngest of seven siblings
and has lived with her partner for five years. She lives in Douala and has been
out of a job for over six months. Her family and neighbors suspect she is a
lesbian, but they do not know for sure. “Where we are renting, the mother
of the owner of the house has complained,” said Aline. “She says
she cannot leave the children around us because we will ‘turn them that
way.’”[113]
Aline spoke in a very soft and shy voice, with difficulty at first and
eventually through tears, as she explained that she is commonly accused of
being a lesbian. This often happens when she goes out to bars or parties on her
own or with a girlfriend.

Last Friday I went out to a bar on my own. I went out to
watch a show. It was very crowded so the doorman sat me in an empty seat next
to a guy. The guy started to flirt with me. I clearly told him I was not there
to meet people and ignored him. He kept offering me drinks and I said no, but
he kept insisting so I finally agreed.

I am not sure what happened next. When I woke up I was in
his bedroom. I saw him over me and screamed, asking what he was doing. He told
me, “I will give you everything.” He threw himself over me and I
hit him. He started to punch me all over. He threw a blow to my head and I
fell. I made as if he had won. He then got close to try to kiss me; I bit him
so hard that I broke off a piece of his lip. I ran out and kept running until I
got home.

The next day I went to see a doctor. He cleaned my wounds,
but I did not tell him what happened.

I am scared of filing a
complaint. I know the guy works in a bank and he lives near me, so he knows or
has guessed that I am a lesbian. A complaint would only make him angrier. If I
go to the police, they would probably say I deserved it. I also don’t
have the money to pay for a lawyer or follow up on the complaint.[114]

Aline said that this is the second time she has been
assaulted. The other time was in March 2009. “Men never see me with
another man. They only see me with another woman. In their minds, they think
that they can force you to be with them.”[115]

Twenty-four-year-old Clarisse recently lost her job as a
waitress. Like Aline, Clarisse spoke to researchers about an assault.

A group of men in my
neighborhood tried to abuse me sexually. It was around 7 p.m. when I was
walking back home. They cornered me in an alley near my house. It was thanks to
a motorcyclist that happened to pass by that I was saved from being raped. I
know they knew that I am lesbian, but I am not sure if that is why they tried
to rape me. I thought of going to the police but saw no point in it. Police will
not listen to a lesbian so I decided to just confide in a friend.[116]

There is no way of knowing with certainty whether Aline and
Clarisse were attacked on grounds of their sexual orientation. However, both
confirmed being taunted about their sexuality and, as lesbians, feeling more
vulnerable to violence without redress.

Attacked at Home

Women are more likely to be controlled and punished for
same-sex relationships in the family sphere than in the public sphere. In one
manifestation of this control, Cameroonian women have little freedom of
movement and their access to public space is highly restricted, which only
means they are less likely to be arrested during a police raid on a gay bar.
However, women are also more prone to abuses in the private sphere than men
are. Researchers heard fewer instances of physical violence against men who
came out to their family than against women. Again, this must be understood
within the context of both homophobia and sexism.

In the six cases of family violence that women reported to
researchers, women felt they could not go to the police because they would be
arrested under Article 347 bis. Furthermore, the sixteen women interviewed for
this report believed the police would not help women like them—poor women
without the means to pay for legal representation and other costs of legal
proceedings.

Thirty-four-year-old Laure identifies as a lesbian and
worked as a beautician until she tested HIV positive in 2009 and stopped
working due to her illness; since then, she has been jobless. Upon realizing
she was a lesbian, her family took away her three children, ages 9, 11, and 13.
Laure feels she has no recourse.

A friend of mine introduced me to her lesbian friend and we
started a relationship together. I returned to live in the family home with my
brothers, sisters and mother. I invited my friend to live with me. My family
quickly figured it out, because my girlfriend was a well-known lesbian. The
neighbors told my brothers, “Your sister is married in your home with another
girl, this girl is a lesbian.” This was enough.…

In 2007, my brothers told my children’s fathers that
I was a lesbian. Immediately a family meeting was convened, and it was decided
that I should not bring the children up. I had no say because I am a lesbian.
So the children now live with their respective fathers. Since that day, my
girlfriend and I were thrown out onto the street. I still try to contact my
children to visit them, but the fathers deny me visits.[117]

Laure started sobbing as she continued her story.

One of my daughters, the
oldest one, tried to run away to see me one day. When she returned, her father
gave her a severe beating. The second-to-oldest child tries to send me text
messages. I cannot but think that my children hate me as a mother. When my
oldest daughter was in the hospital from a burn, I was denied access to see her
from the family. Some of the fathers say I belong to a cult. In 2009, I tested
HIV positive. My family does not know this. They think that my bad health comes
from belonging to this cult.[118]

Researchers spoke to Patricia Njanjo, the head of
Cameroonian Association of Women Lawyers (Association Camerounaise des Femmes
Juristes—ACAFEJ, in French) in Douala about Laure’s case. ACAFEJ is
a national women’s rights organization with regional offices that
represent women in court. Njanjo confirmed that there is no specific law in
Cameroon that dictates that Laure can be denied access to her children on
grounds of her sexual orientation. “Despite the fact that homosexuality
is a crime, it doesn’t mean you do not have rights as heterosexuals
have,” she said.[119]
However, she added, “In practice, if Laure were to go to court to get
custody of her children, she could be accused and convicted for
homosexuality.”[120]
This means that, in fact, Laure’s rights can be stripped away and she
could end up in prison, further away from her children.

Laure tried to get help. “I went to social services to
get access to my children, but they asked for 10,000 francs (US$19). I
don’t have such money.” Social services also asked for legal
documents that would prove she is the children’s mother, but the fathers
have all the documents. Laure’s fear of being sent to prison and her lack
of financial resources stops her from filing a complaint and from fighting for
custody of her children.

Francine is a 24-year-old mother to a six-year old and a
three-year old. She told researchers at Alternatives-Cameroun that in the
community, she found a new family that fills the void left by the family she
lost when she came out.

Three weeks ago, I was kicked out of my house. My relatives
told me that they knew how I lived my life with women. A few weeks before that,
my father beat me up in front of my children for no reason, I thought, but my
older brother then told me it was for being a lesbian. People in the
neighborhood were insulting him [my father] for having a lesbian daughter. My
grandmother was there when he beat me. She did not try to stop him.

But it is nothing new that they have made my life
miserable. A year and a half ago, my aunt hired someone to follow me. That is
how she found out. I work at bars and she learned that I invited girls instead
of men. She told me directly to my face that she sent people to spy on me and
that those people said they’d seen me in “bad places.”

Family is the most precious thing for me, and I have tried
to talk to them, but it hasn’t worked. I had to ask a woman to help me
out in raising my sons after the father of the oldest one tried to take him
away from me for being a lesbian. Even my uncle threatened to turn me in to the
police about three months ago.[121]

Violence Against Women:
Ending Impunity, Ensuring Accountability

National NGOs report that violence against women in Cameroon
is common and usually goes underreported.[122] The 2004
Demographic and Heath Survey in Cameroon reported that 13 percent of
Cameroonian women have been sexually abused.[123]

Article 296 of the Cameroonian Penal Code criminalizes rape.
It mandates imprisonment of five to ten years for any man who uses physical or
psychological violence to force any female, regardless of her age, to have
sexual relations with him. However, this law is not implemented to protect
women and girls, including lesbian and bisexual women and girls, from violence.[124]
Furthermore, there is no law prohibiting domestic violence in Cameroon. In
fact, a 2008 shadow report by a number of women’s organizations in
Cameroon noted that, “Law enforcement officers do not treat domestic
violence with the seriousness it deserves as it is treated as a private matter.
This has led to women shying away from reporting such violence, which is
sometimes fatal.”[125]
The report also portrayed the general situation of women within the family.

Cameroon is a patriarchal society in which customs and
traditions thrive and are promoted in spite of existing modern laws, which
protect women. In marriage, the woman is subordinate to the man; she is seen as
property due to the bride price paid by the husband. Furthermore, some of these
laws are discriminatory. While boys [may] marry at 18 years, girls [may] marry
at 15 years. Polygamy is a legal form of marriage. The inequality which reigns
in marriages and families has created a fertile ground for violence against
women particularly domestic violence.[126]

A bill is pending before parliament since 2007 on the
prevention and punishment of violence against women and discrimination based on
gender. This bill is yet to be approved and does not include violence within
the family, much less any reference to the particular forms of violence that
lesbian and bisexual woman and girls might face.

Cameroon signed and ratified the Convention on the
Elimination of all Forms of Violence against Women (CEDAW) and the Maputo
Protocol. The CEDAW obliges Cameroon to incorporate the convention’s
provisions into national law.[127]
However, it has yet to do so.

The UN special rapporteur on violence against women has
repeatedly expressed concern at the levels of domestic violence against women
worldwide. In particular, the special rapporteur has noted that the
intersection of discrimination against women with other forms of
discrimination, including discrimination based on sexual orientation, create
multiple forms of violence. Radhika Coomaraswamy, the UN special rapporteur on
violence against women from 1994 to 2003, noted that “Gender-based
violence ... is particularly acute when combined with discrimination on the
basis of sexual orientation or change of gender identity. Violence against
sexual minorities is on the increase and it is important that we take up the
challenge of what may be called the last frontier of human rights.”[128]

The UN secretary general has also recognized that women
internationally:

[M]ay encounter violence
based on social prejudices against them because of their sexual orientation.
Forms of violence against lesbian women because of their sexual orientation
include non-partner sexual violence, sexual enslavement, forced marriage and
murder… Numerous cases document lesbians being beaten, raped, forcibly
impregnated or married against their will.[129]

In 1998, Cameroon created the Ministry of Women’s
Affairs to improve the status of women. In 2004, the ministry changed its name
to the Ministry of Women’s Empowerment and Family. There is little
indication that the ministry recognizes that its protection mandate includes
protection of lesbian and bisexual women and girls, in spite of the fact that
they are among the most vulnerable. No lesbians interviewed by researchers had
received assistance from the ministry, which has no policies or programs that
explicitly serve lesbian and bisexual women and girls. Furthermore, researchers
for this report sent a questionnaire to the ministry inquiring about programs
and protections for lesbian and bisexual victims of violence.[130]
At the time this report was written, the ministry had not responded.

No one interviewed for this report knew of a single case of
arrest or prosecution of perpetrators in incidents of violence against
individuals on the grounds of sexual orientation and/or gender expression.
Researchers sent a letter asking the Ministry of Interior about existing
disciplinary actions against police officers who participated in the abuses or
failed to protect the victims, but did not receive a response.[131]

The problem of impunity extends beyond abuses against
lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, but Charles Tombe, the human
rights commissioner for southwest Cameroon, noted, “[i]t is the problem
of the system and those who are vulnerable—women, poor people,
homosexuals—suffer the most.”[132]

Until the Ministry of Interior sends a public message to the
police that ill-treatment on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender
expression will not be tolerated, the police will continue to stand by or join
the attackers.

In Hiding

To avoid being insulted,
beaten, and shunned by family, some gay, lesbian, and bisexual Cameroonians
believe the only solution for them is to hide their sexuality. The best way to
avoid suspicion, interviewees said, is to have what they called a
“cover-up”—a partner of the opposite sex in a sham
relationship, where the other person in the relationship is not aware of their
sexual orientation. This is common. For instance, Marius told researchers for
this report that he has a girlfriend and that of his eight closest gay friends,
five have girlfriends as well.

Agnes, 32, lives with her family in Yaoundé. “I
have a boyfriend,” she told researchers for this report.
“It’s not that I want one, but I am compelled to have sex with him.
I have to show my family that I am with a man. That is also the reason that I
had a child. My boyfriend has asked me about three times if I am a lesbian. I have
denied it every time.”[133]

Similarly, 23-year-old Martin has a girlfriend. He paints
houses in Yaoundé for a living. He and his girlfriend have been together
for two years and are expecting a baby. We asked Martin if he felt any
difficulty having relationships with both men and women. He said, “I fear
my family and my girlfriend. They would not be happy if they find out. They
would shun me. My girlfriend would be very angry, and God knows what her
parents would do to me! The way I see it is that I have to program myself. I
have to hide and then it should be fine.”[134]

Jean Louis, a 21-year-old history student in Buea, also has
a girlfriend and a boyfriend. “My family suspects that I am gay,”
he said, “but I denied it. The pressure is there and I feel that I have
to get married just to please my parents and friends. I wish it wasn’t
so, but it is, so I have been going out with a girl for a year.”[135]

“I am very secretive,” said 30-year-old Marthe,
a professional soccer player, who also has a boyfriend and a girlfriend.

I don’t talk to anyone about my relationships or my
life in general. I would like it to be different, I would like to express
myself more freely, but it’s impossible. I do this [have a relationship
with another woman] because of my feelings. It is what I feel. Still, I have to
have a boyfriend. I have been with one for four years and with my girlfriend
for two and a half. My boyfriend is a cover. My family thinks that if you are
athletic and you don’t have a boyfriend then you are a lesbian. I cannot
afford for them to think this about me. I am very Catholic, and in my church,
they think this is sorcery.

Fear of discovery also dictates people’s behavior with
their “cover up” partners. Forty-six-year old Joseph works as a
trader and self-identifies as a bisexual man. He has been married for seven
years. He told researchers,

I got married because that is what you do in Cameroon. I
worked and then it was time to find a wife. I do have sex with other men. The
last time was three months ago. I don’t like wearing a condom when I am
with men and will only use it if they ask me to. With my wife, I would never
use a condom! She’s my wife! If I use a condom with her, she will think
something fishy is going on.[137]

Alicia, a 40-year-old lesbian, pointed out the difficulties
with negotiating condom usage from a women’s perspective.

It’s not easy to play the submissive woman before a
man when you don’t want men to touch you. And yet, you have to be with
them, have sex with men and have their children. You have to have sex with your
husband without a condom to avoid suspicion and then you have sex with another
woman on the side.[138]

Neighbors, family members, and others police sexuality, so
most people interviewed for this report told researchers that they seek to live
their lives in secrecy, afraid of the consequences if they were discuss their
sexualities publicly. In other instances, secrecy can easily translate into
attacks and fear of seeking protection and redress. For lesbian, gay, bisexual,
and transgender people in Cameroon, it becomes a losing situation. People are
further driven underground and refuse to complain due to the history of attacks
by police officers and the belief that authorities will not take the violence
seriously.

Conclusion

Article 347 bis has been used and continues to be used
against a particular group of Cameroonians that deserves equal treatment and
respect under the law, not violence, abuse, and legal persecution. Violation to
their fundamental rights begins when police use people's perceived or real
sexual orientation as grounds for arrest and ill-treatment in custody.
Individuals then go to prison, where they are subject to abuse by prison
authorities and fellow inmates. Even outside the criminal justice system, the
existence of a law criminalizing homosexual conduct makes people more
vulnerable to attacks. When LGBT people are victims of family disputes,
domestic abuse, rape, and even random street crime, they may fear reporting it
because they could be accused and prosecuted for homosexuality. People live in
constant fear, assuming rigid gender codes to cover up, and conducting
relationships in secrecy. The only way Cameroon can protect these people is to
end the criminalization of homosexuality and provide effective legal
protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people under the law.

To the President of
Cameroon

End arrests and prosecutions for children under 18 for homosexual
conduct or for their perceived sexual orientation.

Publicly condemn all acts of violence, discrimination, and
intolerance against individuals on the grounds of their real or perceived
sexual orientation and/or gender identity.

Amend the national HIV/AIDS strategic plan of Cameroon to
explicitly include men who have sex with men and women who have sex with women.

Condemn homophobic speech by all government officials.

Allow for organizations doing
work on sexuality, gender, sexual orientation and gender identity to register
as such, ensuring their protection and participation as civil society.

To the Ministry of
Interior

Issue a directive to all levels of police to refrain from active
investigation or pursuit of charges against consensual homosexual sexual
activity.

Gather data on arrests of
individuals to date under Articles 346 and 347 bis, as well as reports of
police misconduct, including violence, extortion, ill-treatment, and torture,
and take disciplinary action against police personnel found guilty of
misconduct.

Introduce sensitivity and human rights training on sexual
orientation, gender identity, and HIV/AIDS for police at all levels.

Publicly denounce the
targeting of vulnerable populations by police, including ending the
surveillance of public places considered to be frequented by homosexuals.

Promote campaigns to encourage people to report violence and
arbitrariness by public authorities.

To the Ministry of Justice

Train judges and prosecutors on human rights standards, including
non-discrimination, sexual orientation and gender identity, with the aim of
ending stigma and prejudice on these grounds.

Investigate all convictions under Article 347 bis for violations
of due process, including convictions in the absence of evidence, arrests
without warrants, and forced confessions, and overturn all that do not fulfill
procedural requirements.

End the practice of forensic anal examinations and their use as
evidence.

Issue a directive to the general prosecutor to stop detentions
and prosecutions under Article 347 bis until the said article is repealed.

To the Ministry of
Women’s Empowerment and Family

Organize a consultation with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and
transgender groups and women’s rights organizations to address the needs
of self-identified lesbian and bisexual women and girls, as well as women who
have sex with women.

Make clear that self-identified lesbian and bisexual women and
girls, as well as women who have sex with women, are included in the
ministry’s mandate and in its policies and programs.

To the Ministry of
Health

Train all health care staff in
all public clinics on sexual orientation and gender identity, including through
identifying and training more peer educators for MSM and WSW;

Increase the number public health clinics in remote areas that
provide treatment and care for people, including MSM and WSW, living with
HIV/AIDS.

Ensure distribution of adequate amounts of condoms and lubricant
in testing and treatment centers and prisons.

Publicly and financially support the work of MSM and WSW peer
educators and fulfill the commitments made in the National Strategic Plan to
better incorporate these populations into HIV/AIDS outreach and prevention
strategies.

Condemn publicly attacks and
arrests against human rights defenders working on sexual rights.

To Police Authorities

End arrests under Article 347 bis.

Investigate all claims of verbal and physical abuse or threats
against individuals on the grounds of sexual orientation and/or gender
identity, and ensure fair and impartial investigations of the complaints that
hold perpetrators accountable to the fullest extent of the law.

To Prison Authorities

Issue detailed regulations to protect prisoners from abuse on the
basis of real or perceived sexual orientation and gender identity.

Allow the introduction of condoms in prisons and facilitate
distribution.

To the Media

Report on attacks against individuals on the basis of sexual
orientation, gender identity or HIV/AIDS status without bias.

Adopt a voluntary code of ethics for reporting on issues related
to gender, sexual orientation and gender identity, and HIV/AIDS.

Train editors and reporters to cover issues related to sexual
orientation and gender identity, and HIV/AIDS, without bias.

Establish regular meetings between editors and NGO
representatives working to improve media representation of lesbian, gay, bisexual,
and transgender people.

To Religious Leaders

Refrain from engaging in rhetoric that incites followers
to violence.

Condemn publicly the attacks against individuals on the
basis of their real or perceived sexual orientation, gender identity or
HIV/AIDS status.

For leaders of the Catholic Church: advocate for the
decriminalization of homosexuality in Cameroon in accordance with the
December 2008 statement at the UN by the Holy See supporting
decriminalization around the globe.

To UNAIDS and Other UN Agencies

Monitor and condemn violence against MSM, WSW, LGBT persons, and
people living with HIV/AIDS or engaged in HIV/AIDS outreach and prevention.

Assist the government of
Cameroon to reformulate national and local policies and programs on HIV/AIDS
frameworks to reduce stigma of vulnerable populations, such as MSM, WSW, LGBT
persons, and people living with HIV/AIDS, including in prison settings.

To the European Union

Raise and condemn human rights violations on the grounds of
sexual orientation, gender identity and HIV/AIDS status in all bilateral
discussions with the government of Cameroon.

Implement the “Toolkit to Promote and Protect the Enjoyment
of all Human Rights of LGBT people” in all embassies and consulates in
Cameroon or in the regional hub.

Specifically work toward decriminalization of consenting same-sex
relations; monitor the human rights situation of LGBT people and denounce any
forms of abuse or discrimination; and support and protect human rights
defenders in Cameroon working on LGBT and HIV/AIDS issues.

It was reviewed and edited by Steave Nemande, president of
Alternatives-Cameroun; Alice Nkom, president of ADEFHO; Jessica Stern, director
of programs, and Sam Cook, director of communications and research, at the
International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission; and by the following
people at Human Rights Watch: Scott Long, former director of the LGBT Rights
Program; Katherine Wiltenburg Todrys, Bernstein Fellow in the Health and Human
Rights Division; Agnes Odhiambo, researcher in the Women’s Rights
Division; Lois Whitman, director of the Children Rights Division; Rona Peligal,
deputy director of the Africa Division; Clive Baldwin, legal advisor; and Robin
Shulman, consultant to the Program Office.

Grace Choi, publications
director, Kathy Mills, publications and program office coordinator, and Anna
Lopriore, photo editor, provided assistance with report design and publication.
Fitzroy Hepkins, mail manager, made possible the production of the report.
Jessica Ognian, senior associate for the LGBT Rights Program at Human Rights
Watch prepared this report for publication.

Finally, we are deeply grateful to all those people in
Cameroon who shared their personal experiences with us.

Appendix I: International Legal Standards

Cameroon is bound by international human rights treaties and
customary law, and is accountable to the international community for protecting
and promoting the human rights of all its people. Cameroon acceded to the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) on June 27, 1984,
and the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights (ACHPR) on June 20, 1989.
Both treaties place obligations on Cameroonian authorities to protect and
promote various human rights as well as protect and provide the conditions
necessary for the realization of these rights. Cameroon also ratified the
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW)
on August 23, 1994 and the Maputo Protocol on May 28, 2009.

Right to Privacy

Article 17 of the ICCPR guarantees that “No one shall
be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with his privacy,” and
further guarantees the right to protection from such interference. In the 1994
case of Nicholas Toonen v. Australia, the UN Human Rights Committee, which
monitors compliance with and adjudicates violations under the ICCPR, heard a
complaint concerning a “sodomy law” punishing consensual, adult
homosexual conduct in the Australian state of Tasmania. The committee held that
such laws violate protections against discrimination in the ICCPR, as well as
Article 17. Specifically, the committee held that “sexual
orientation” was a status protected under the ICCPR from discrimination,
finding that “the reference to ‘sex’ in articles 2, paras. 1
and 26 is to be taken as including sexual orientation.”[139]

The Right to Freedom
from Arbitrary Arrest and Detention

Article 9 of the ICCPR
guarantees to all the “right to liberty and security of person” and
protection from arbitrary arrest or detention. The right to security places an
obligation upon the state to protect individuals against threats of physical
violence. The UN Human Rights Committee has criticized states' failure to
protect people from violence based on sexual orientation.[140]

The travaux preparatoires to Article 9 of the
Convention make clear, in the words of one commentator, that
“arbitrary” means not simply “unlawful” arrest or
detention, but includes police or judicial actions that display “elements
of injustice, unpredictability, unreasonableness, capriciousness and
unproportionality,” though the reason for the arrest may lie within the
letter of the law. In particular, “the specific manner in which an arrest
is made must not be discriminatory and must be able to be deemed appropriate
and proportional in view of the circumstances of the case.”[141]

Similarly, Articles 4 and 6 of the ACHPR declare that
everyone is entitled to respect for her/his life and integrity of her/his
person, that no one may be deprived of these rights arbitrarily, including
through arrest and detention, and that everyone has the right to liberty and
security of person.

Protection Against Torture,
Inhuman, and Degrading Treatment

Articles 7 and 10 of the ICCPR protect against torture or
“cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” and stipulate
that all persons shall be treated with humanity and dignity at all times,
including while in detention or other official custody. Article 5 of the ACHPR
likewise prohibits “torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment and
treatment” and guarantees the right to respect for the inherent dignity
of persons.

The ICCPR and the Convention against Torture and Other
Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment of Punishment (CAT—acceded by
Cameroon in 1986) detail what states must do to enforce the prohibition,
including the duty to investigate, prosecute, and provide effective remedies
when violations occur.[142]

The Rights of Prisoners
Under International Law

Under international human rights law,
prisoners retain their human rights and fundamental freedoms, except for such
restrictions on their rights required by the fact of incarceration; the
conditions of detention should not aggravate the suffering inherent in
imprisonment, except as necessary for justifiable segregation or the
maintenance of discipline.[143]This rule cannot be dependent on the
material resources available to the national government in question.[144]
Cameroon is bound by this framework, as a party to the ICCPR.

The ICCPR also requires that “[a]ll persons deprived
of their liberty shall be treated with humanity and with respect for the
inherent dignity of the human person.”[145] The African
Charter also protects every individual’s human dignity and prohibits
“all forms of exploitation and degradation,” including slavery,
torture, and cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment and treatment.[146]
Numerous international instruments provide further guidance on the protection
and respect for the human rights of persons deprived of their liberty.[147]

The Right to the Highest
Attainable Standard of Health

In its General Comment 14, the UN Committee on Economic,
Social, and Cultural

Rights, charged with overseeing the application of the
International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, specifically
noted that the said Covenant, to which Cameroon is party, should be read to bar
“any discrimination in access to health care and underlying determinants
of health, as well as to means and entitlements for their procurement, on the
grounds of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion,
national or social origin, property, birth, physical or mental disability,
health status (including HIV/AIDS), sexual orientation and civil, political,
social or other status, which has the intention or effect of nullifying or
impairing the equal enjoyment or exercise of the right to health.”[148]

The Right to Freedom of
Expression, Association, and Information

Article 19 of the ICCPR
guarantees freedom of expression, and Article 21 secures all persons' freedom
of assembly. Article 9 of the ACHPR guarantees everyone the right to
information and the right to freedom of expression, and Article 10 provides
everyone the right to free association.

The UN mechanisms also touch upon the right to freedom of
expression for human rights organizations working on defending the human rights
of LGBT people considering “that all citizens, regardless of, inter alia,
their sexual orientation, have the right to express themselves, and to seek,
receive and impart information.”[149]

Non-discrimination and Equal
Protection of the Law

Article 2 of the ICCPR requires that a state “ensure
to all individuals within its territory and subject to its jurisdiction the
rights recognized in the present Covenant, without distinction of any
kind.” Article 26 of the ICCPR guarantees that all persons are equal
before the law and entitled to equal protection of the law. The UN Human Rights
Committee has made clear on several occasions that sexual orientation is a
status protected against discrimination under these provisions.[150]
Article 2 of the ACHPR states, “Every individual shall be entitled to the
enjoyment of the rights and freedoms recognized and guaranteed in the present
Charter without distinction of any kind.” Article 3 guarantees that
everyone is equal before the law and shall have equal protection of the law.
Article 19 promises: “All peoples shall be equal; they shall enjoy the
same respect and shall have the same rights.”

The Human Rights of Women
Under CEDAW and Maputo Protocol

CEDAW commits states in its Article 1 to the eradication of
“any distinction, exclusion or restriction made on the basis of sex which
has the effect or purpose of impairing or nullifying the recognition, enjoyment
or exercise by women, irrespective of their marital status, on a basis of
equality of men and women, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the
political, economic, social, cultural, civil or any other field.”

The Convention also protects the rights of women to economic
and social equality, including participating in both the planning and the
benefits of development, as well as their right to “participate in all
community activities” (Article 11, Article 14). It protects their right
to equality in education, including the “elimination of any stereotyped
concept of the roles of men and women at all levels and in all forms of
education” (Article 10.c). And it mandates that states
“modify the social and cultural patterns of conduct of men and women,
with a view to achieving the elimination of prejudices and customary and other
practices which are based on the idea of the inferiority or the superiority of
either of the sexes or on stereotyped roles for men and women” (Article
5.a).

These protections are
violated when states reinforce stereotyped gender roles by heaping further
stigma upon those who contravene them. They are violated when states encourage
communities to discriminate against, or drive out, nonconforming women. They
are violated when states condone an atmosphere of violence, in which women who
do not conform to gender roles or other social expectations may be abused or
raped, in public spaces or in the home.

The Convention requires states to act against abuse and
discrimination in families and communities. The UN Special Rapporteur on
Violence against Women has observed that communities:

‘[p]olice’ the behaviour of their female
members. A woman who is perceived to be acting in a manner deemed to be
sexually inappropriate by communal standards is liable to be punished.…
In most communities, the option available to women for sexual activity is
confined to marriage with a man from the same community. Women who choose
options which are disapproved of by the community, whether to have a sexual
relationship with a man in a non-marital relationship, to have such a
relationship outside of ethnic, religious or class communities, or to live out
their sexuality in ways other than heterosexuality, are often subjected to
violence and degrading treatment.… Women “unprotected”
by a marriage union with a man, are vulnerable members of the community, often
marginalized in community social practices and the victims of social ostracism
and abuse.[151]

The Maputo Protocol provides similar protections for women
against discrimination.[152]
Article 13 on the right to dignity states: “[e]very woman shall have the
right to respect as a person and to the free development of her
personality.” It also calls on states to adopt measures against all forms
of violence, including sexual and verbal violence and provides a specific
provision for remedies against abuses (Article 25).

The Human Rights of Children

The Convention on the
Rights of the Child (ratified on September 25, 1990),[153]
and The African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (ratified on May
9, 1997),[154] provide broad civil and
political rights for children under 18, including due process rights under the
penal law.[155]

Appendix II: Glossary

Biological sex:The biological classification of bodies as male
or female based on such factors as external sex organs, internal sexual and
reproductive organs, hormones, and chromosomes.

Bisexual: A person who is attracted to people of both
sexes.

Gay: A synonym for homosexual. Sometimes used to
describe only men who are attracted primarily to other men.

Gendarmes: A branch of the police in charge of the
protection in small villages and towns.

Gender: The socialand cultural codes (as
opposed to biological sex) used to distinguish between what a society considers
"masculine" or "feminine" conduct.

Gender-based violence: Violence directed against a
person on the basis of gender or sex. Gender-based violence can include sexual
violence, domestic violence, psychological abuse, sexual exploitation, sexual
harassment, harmful traditional practices, and discriminatory practices. The
term originally described violence against women but is now widely taken to
include violence targeting both women and men because of how they experience
and express their genders and sexualities.

Gender expression: The external characteristics and
behaviors that societies define as "masculine" or
"feminine"—including such attributes as dress, appearance,
mannerisms, speech patterns, and social behavior and interactions.

Gender identity: A person's internal, deeply felt
sense of being a woman or a man, or something other than or in between a woman
or a man.

Heterosexual: A person attracted primarily to people
of the opposite sex.

Homosexual: A person attracted primarily to people of
the same sex.

Lesbian: A woman attracted primarily to other women.

LGBT: Lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender; an
inclusive term for groups and identities sometimes also associated together as
"sexual minorities."

Men who have sex with men: Men who engage in sexual
behavior with other men, but do not necessarily identify as "gay,"
"homosexual" or "bisexual."

Pédé: French slang for homosexual, derived from
“pédéraste,” that has a negative connotation.

Sexism: The belief or attitude that one gender or sex
is inferior to, less competent than, or less valuable than the other. It can
also designate prejudice towards either sex as a whole, or the application of
stereotypes of masculinity in relation to men, or of femininity in relation to
women.

Sexual orientation: The way in which a person's sexual and emotional
desires are directed. The term categorizes according to the sex of the object
of desire—that is, it describes whether a person is attracted primarily
to people of the same or opposite sex, or to both.

Transgender: An umbrella term for people whose gender
identity, expression or behavior is different from that typically associated
with their assigned sex at birth, including but not limited to transsexuals,
travestis, transvestites, transgenderists, cross-dressers, and gender
nonconforming people. It may include people whose felt gender identity differs
from the physical characteristics of their body at birth. Female-to-male (FTM)
transgender people were assigned female at birth but identify primarily as men;
male-to-female (MTF) transgender people were assigned male at birth but
identify primarily as women. Transgender people may be heterosexual, lesbian,
gay, or bisexual. Transgender as it is used in the US has limited resonance in
many other countries. The term does not convey the multiple and diverse
expressions of gender identity or the intersecting expressions of sexual
desire, intimacy and gender nonconformity.

Transsexual: One who seeks to undergo or has
undergone bodily modification such as sex reassignment surgery so that his/her
physical sex corresponds to his/her felt gender identity.

Women who have sex with women: Women who engage in
sexual behavior with other women, but do not necessarily identify as
"gay," "homosexual," "lesbian" or "bisexual."

[1]Interview with Alice Nkom, lawyer involved in the case, Douala,
September 22, 2009. These women declined to be interviewed for this report for
fear that they would be identified as lesbians by their families.

[2]
Information of these arrests in the hands of Alternatives-Cameroun.

[7]
Human Rights Council, “Report on the Working Group on the Universal
periodic Review,” A/HRC/11/21, October 12, 2009, paras. 20, 22, 25, 28,
29, 32, and 46, available at
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/UPR/Pages/CMSession4.aspx (accessed March 1,
2010). “Argentina recommended Cameroon considering the possibility of
reforming the laws criminalizing homosexuality and adapting them to
international standards.” Canada asked Cameroon to “… (b)
amend its Penal Code to abolish the criminalization of homosexual acts to
conform to the provisions of the ICCPR, particularly articles 2 and 26, and the
provisions of the African Charter of Human Rights and Peoples’
Rights.” France recommended “ … respect international
provisions in the area of protection of minorities and vulnerable groups,…
(c) and non-discrimination against homosexuals.” Luxemburg joined the
others recommending Cameroon to “… (c) reform its legislative
arsenal on this point and establish effective protection of homosexuals against
discrimination and attacks.” Czech Republic recommended “…(d)
the decriminalization of same-sex activity between consenting adults and
adoption of measures to promote tolerance in this regards, which would also
facilitate more effective educational programmes for the prevention of
HIV/AIDS.” Brazil recommended “… (c) to amend domestic law
regarding homosexuality, with a view to decriminalize it;” Mexico asked
that “… (b) that all national legislation that criminalized homosexuality
be brought into line with the Universal Declaration on Human Rights and other
relevant instruments;”

[9] Article 347 bis reads, “Whoever has sexual relations with a person of
the same sex shall be punished with imprisonment for form six months to five
years and fine of from 20,000 to 200,000 francs.” The law does not
differentiate between men and women. LGBT organizations in Cameroon confirm
that the law applies to both, though most reported cases of
arrest and prosecution at the
time of writing are of men.

[11]Abega was held in a mental health unit in Jamot hospital until 2009.

[12]Micah King, “Homosexuality in Cameroon’s Public Sphere;
Rejecting Homosexuality as Protest against the Other,” Undergraduate
Research Digest, Vol. 2, No. 2, Washington University, spring 2007, available
at ur.wustl.edu/WUURD/wuurdspring07.pdf (accessed July 20, 2010). The Catholic
Church also protested the ratification by Cameroon of the Protocol to the
African Charter on Human Rights and People’s Rights on the Rights of
Women in Africa (Maputo Protocol)—which guarantees comprehensive rights
to women—in July 2009. The church leaders accused the government of
legalizing abortion and homosexuality by ratifying the Protocol. Behind
the Mask, “Church manipulates public opinion on homosexuality,”
available at http://www.mask.org.za/.

[13]Quoted in La Nouvelle Expression, No. 1641, January 5,
2006, pp. 6-7; Habibou Bangré “L’Archeveque de
Yaoundé Critique L’homosexualité lors de son Homélie de Noel,” Tetu Magazine, January 3, 2006,
available at http://www.tetu.com/actualites/international/Larcheveque-de-Yaounde-critique-lhomosexualite-lors-de-son-homelie-de-Nol-9136
(accessed September 11, 2010).
The Holy See issued a statement in December 2008 supporting decriminalization
of homosexuality. Archbishop Celestino Migliore clarified the Holy See’s
position on this matter, "The Holy See continues to advocate that every
sign of unjust discrimination towards homosexual persons should be avoided and
urges States to do away with criminal penalties against them." Holy See,
"Statement of the Holy See Delegation at the 63rd Session of the UN
General Assembly on the Declaration on Human Rights, Sexual Orientation and Gender
Identity," December 18, 2008, available at
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/secretariat_state/2008/documents/rc_seg-st_20081218_statement-sexual-orientation_en.html
(accessed September 11, 2010).

[15]“Le Top 50 des Homosexuels Présumés du
Cameroun,” L’Anecdote, No. 254, January 24, 2006, p. 3-6.
this list included three women and 47 men. The men included three dead former
government officials, as well as sports promoters, journalists, CEOs, and
members of civil society.

[16]“La Liste complète des
Homosexuels du Cameroun,”
L’Anecdote, No. 255,
January 25, 2006. This list included former members of the
Catholic Church, two dead people, a number of high-ranking government
officials, businessmen, and one woman.

[24]Homosexuality, as well as other “indecent” conducts
are criminalized by the Cameroonian Penal Code under the chapter of
“Felonies and Misdemeanors against Private Interest.” Article 295
criminalizes “private indecency;” article 346 condemns
“indecency to child under sixteen;” article 346 criminalizes
“indecency to minor between sixteen and twenty-one;” and article
347 bis condemns “sex with the person of the same sex.”
Alternatives-Cameroun, “Projet Atteintes aux bonnes mœurs (Project
347 bis),” December 2007.

[25]
The minimum age for marriage for women in Cameroon is 15 and 18 for men.
Parental consent is sufficient for women under 15 to get married.

[30]
Human Rights Council, “Report on the Working Group on the Universal
periodic Review,” A/HRC/11/21, October 12, 2009, paras. 20, 22, 25, 28,
29, 32, and 46, available at
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/UPR/Pages/CMSession4.aspx (accessed
March 1, 2010). “Argentina recommended Cameroon considering the
possibility of reforming the laws criminalizing homosexuality and adapting them
to international standards.” Canada asked Cameroon to “… (b)
amend its Penal Code to abolish the criminalization of homosexual acts to
conform to the provisions of the ICCPR, particularly articles 2 and 26, and the
provisions of the African Charter of Human Rights and Peoples’
Rights.” France recommended “ … respect international
provisions in the area of protection of minorities and vulnerable
groups,… (c) and non-discrimination against homosexuals.” Luxemburg
joined the others recommending Cameroon to “… (c) reform its
legislative arsenal on this point and establish effective protection of
homosexuals against discrimination and attacks.” Czech Republic
recommended “…(d) the decriminalization of same-sex activity
between consenting adults and adoption of measures to promote tolerance in this
regards, which would also facilitate more effective educational programmes for
the prevention of HIV/AIDS.” Brazil recommended “… (c) to
amend domestic law regarding homosexuality, with a view to decriminalize
it;” Mexico asked that “… (b) that all national legislation
that criminalized homosexuality be brought into line with the Universal
Declaration on Human Rights and other relevant instruments.”

[46]Researchers made several efforts to interview those detained, but they
declined. Amnesty International, “2007 Annual Report Cameroon,” 2007, available at http://www.amnestyusa.org/annualreport.php?id=ar&yr=2007&c=CMR (accessed February 11, 2010).

[50]Section
93 and Section 103. According to Article 103 of the CPP, “felonies and
misdemeanours are deemed to be committed in flagrante delicto
where they in the course of being committed or when they have just been
committed.”

[62]
Adopted by the First UN Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment
of Offenders, Geneva 1951, and approved by the Economic and Social Council by
Resolution, 663C (XXIV), July 31, 1957 and 2076 (LXII), May 13, 1977,
Principles 29, available at
http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/treatmentprisoners.htm (accessed April 22,
2010).

[63]
“Requérons: Monsieur le
Médecin chef des Urgences de l’hôpital Central de
Yaoundé, de procéder a l’examen des nommés xxx dans
le but de confirmer ou infirmer leurs présumes qualités
d’homosexuels [sic].”[ National Gendarmerie, Nlongkak Brigade, Exam
Request, August 16, 2007 (in
file with Human Rights Watch);
Gendarmerie Nationale, Brigade de Nlongkak, Enquête de Flagrance, P.V.
No. 401/2007, August 17, 2007 (in file with Human Rights Watch). The
examination appears to reflect the discredited ideas of a 19th-century French
forensic doctor, Auguste Ambroise Tardieu (1818-1879), who published his
Étude médico-légale sur les attentats aux mœurs
("Forensic Study of Assaults against Decency") in 1857. Its blend of
scientific tenor and prurient themes made it a bestseller, and it had
considerable influence on medical investigations in areas-including the Ottoman
territories-where the prestige of French medicine was high. The book laid
guidelines for investigating three offenses: public "outrages against
decency"; rape; and "pederasty and sodomy," terms it used
interchangeably for adult male homosexual acts. Tardieu believed that
"habitual pederasty" left certain signs on the body, the
"knowledge of which will permit the forensic doctor, in the great majority
of cases, to direct with sureness the pursuits which involve public morality to
such a high degree." In the case of the "passive" partner these
marks allegedly included an elastic and funnel-shaped anus. Dr. Lorna Martin,
professor of forensic pathology at the University of Cape Town, South Africa,
calls Tardieu's theory of permanently altered anus "bizarre and antiquated
… rubbish." She adds, "It is impossible to detect chronic anal
penetration; the only time the [forensic anal] examination could be of any use
is for acute non-consensual anal penetration, when certain injuries may be
seen." Auguste Ambroise Tardieu, Etude Médico-légale sur les
Attentats aux Mœurs, 3rd ed. (Paris: J. B. Bailliere, 1859), p. 135. For a
fuller discussion of Tardieu's theories and the forensic examinations conducted
on their basis in Egypt. Human Rights Watch, In a Time of Torture: The Assault
on Justice In Egypt's Crackdown on Homosexual Conduct, March 2004.

[65]Human Rights Watch, “Letter to the Minister of Justice of Cameroon
regarding 11 Men Detained on Suspicion of Homosexual Activity,” November
30, 2005, available at
http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2005/11/30/letter-minister-justice-cameroon-regarding-11-men-detained-suspicion-homosexual-acti
(accessed September 11, 2010).

[68]Special Rapporteur on the question of torture and other cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment or punishment, “Interim report,” A/56/156, July
3, 2001, para. 23, available at
http://www.unhchr.ch/Huridocda/Huridoca.nsf/(Symbol)/A.56.156.En?Opendocument
(accessed September 11, 2010) The report explains how people in detention can
be considered a sub category of prisoners on the grounds of their perceived
sexual orientation, making them more vulnerable “violence, especially
sexual assault and rape, by fellow inmates and, at times, by prison
guards. Prison guards are also said to fail to take reasonable measures to
abate the risk of violence by fellow inmates or even to have encouraged sexual
violence, by identifying members of sexual minorities to fellow inmates for
that express purpose.”

[73]Prison officials delegate disciplinary authority “chiefs”
among the inmates. They are responsible for safeguarding security in the cells
and also imposing punishments. Chiefs commonly use their power arbitrarily over
other inmates, resulting in prisoner exploitation and widespread abuse, in
particular to vulnerable inmates, like those who are perceived to be gay.

[74]Pre-trial detainees and convicted prisoners are routinely mixed in
Cameroon. The World Prison Brief, “Prison Brief for Cameroon,”
available at
http://www.kcl.ac.uk/depsta/law/research/icps/worldbrief/wpb_country.php?country=7.

[75]Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, Principle 29.

[81]Interview with Armand, Yaoundé, September 12, 2009. According to
Armand within each cell, different prisoners have different responsibilities.
In order of importance they have a president, a prime minister, secretary,
president of the court, state council, and minister of state.

[95]Researchers also found that prisoners sleep in cells with other 40-50
inmates, all on mattresses or on the floor and in a room of approximately 20
mts x 20mts. Some interviewees talked about threats of being raped and
researchers documented at least two cases of male rape. Measures to prevent
HIV/AIDS in prison should take these risk factors into account and include ways
to prevent them.

[98]WHO, Summary Country Profile: Cameroon, 2005, for information about HIV
treatment and coverage for the general population, available at
http://www.who.int/hiv/HIVCP_CMR.pdf. Sylvia Boyer and others, “Financial
Barriers to HIV Treatment in Yaoundé,” available at,
http://www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/87/4/07-049643/en/print.html.

[102]According to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of
Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) it falls upon states to eliminate
"[p]rejudices and customary and other practices which are based on the
idea of the inferiority or the superiority of either of the sexes or on
stereotyped roles for men and women.” Convention on the Elimination of
all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), G.A. Res. 34/180, U.N. Doc.
A/34/46, ratified by Cameroon on August 23, 1994, article 5(a).

[103]Roles that men and women should play in Cameroonian society are even
found within schoolbooks. A research done by the Centre of Population and
Development found “a predominance of male characters and a polarization
between activities, attributes, roles and status of women and men, the male
characters playing the roles most rewarding roles of authority and power,
operating and owning property paid values, while the female characters often
play supporting roles, family or domestic support.” Hélène
Kamdem Kamgno, “Évolution des rapports de genre au fil du cycle
primaire dans les manuels de mathématiques au Cameroun,” available
at http://www.ceped.org/cdrom/manuels_scolaires/sp/chapitre3.html (accessed
September 11, 2010).

[122]
Interview with Esther Endalè, Founder, Association Fighting Violence
against Women, September 24, 2009; Interview with Nadine Ekotto, President,
Association Fighting Violence against Women, September 24, 2009. Gender
Empowerment and Development, and others, “NGO Report on the
Implementation of the IICPR,” June 2010, pp.12, and 15, available at
http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrc/docs/ngos/GeED_Cameroon_HRC99.pdf
(accessed September 22, 2010).

[123]Teke Johnson Takwa, “Violence against the Women and the Girl
Children in Cameroon,” Poster presented at the International Conference
on Population, 2009, available at
http://iussp2009.princeton.edu/download.aspx?submissionId=90344 (accessed April
22, 2010).

[124]Article 297 of the Penal Code expunges the rape offence if the
perpetrator marries the victim.

[125]Women in Research and Action (WIRA), Network for Peace and Development
(NEPED), International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA), Cameroon Association
of Women Lawyers (ACAFEJ), “The Implementation of the Convention on the
Elimination of All forms of Discrimination against Women,” 2007,
available at http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/cedaw/cedaws43.htm (accessed
April 22, 2010), p. 45-46.

[126]Ibid., “The Implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of
All forms of Discrimination against Women,” 2007, p. 13.

[127]
Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Violence Against Women,
“Status of Signatories and Ratifications”, available at:
http://treaties.un.org/Pages/ViewDetails.aspx?src=TREATY&mtdsg_no=IV-8&chapter=4&lang=en
(accessed August 20, 2010).

[128]Statement by the Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women to the
Commission on Human Rights, fifty-eighth session, April 10, 2002, available at
http://www2.ohchr.org/english/issues/women/rapporteur/docs/15YearReviewofVAWMandate.pdf
(accessed August 20, 2010), p. 38.

[130]
Letters from Alternatives-Cameroun, ADEFHO, IGLHRC, and Human Rights Watch, to
Marie-Thérèse Abena, Ministry of Women’s Empowerment and
Family, Yaoundé, November 20, 2009 and April 29, 2010. Both letters went
unanswered.

[131]
Letters from Alternatives-Cameroun, ADEFHO, IGLHRC, and Human Rights Watch,
Jean-Baptiste Bokam, State Secretary of the Gendarmerie, November 20, 2009 and
April 29, 2010. Both letters went unanswered.

[147]The most comprehensive such guidelines are the United
Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners. Other relevant
instruments include the Body of Principles for the Protection of All Persons
under Any Form of Detention or Imprisonment, the Basic Principles for the
Treatment of Prisoners, and, for juvenile prisoners, the United Nations
Standard Minimum Rules for the Administration of Juvenile Justice.

[148]Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, General Comment 14,
The right to the highest attainable standard of health (Twenty-second session,
2000), UN Doc. E/C.12/2000/4 (2000), reprinted in Compilation of General
Comments and General Recommendations Adopted by Human Rights Treaty Bodies, UN
Doc. HRI/GEN/1/Rev.6 at 85 (2003), para. 18, available at
http://humanrights.law.monash.edu.au/gencomm/escgencom14.htm (accessed May 2,
2010).

[149]Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Freedom of Opinion and
Expression, Mission to Colombia, E/CN.4/2005/64/Add.3, November 26, 2004, para.
75.